


The Lessons We Learned

by Sheksper



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Aliens, Alternate Universe - Flower Shop, Attempted Rape/Non-Con, Bisexual Lance (Voltron), Cats, Cigarettes, Daddy Issues, Developing Friendships, Friendship/Love, Gen, Happy Ending, Japanese Keith (Voltron), Keith and Acxa are Siblings, Keith and Shiro are Siblings, M/M, Motorcycles, Oblivious Keith (Voltron), Pining Lance (Voltron), Qualia Under The Snow AU, Questioning Keith, Shiro and Acxa are Siblings, Slow Burn, Smoking, Waiter Lance, florist keith, themes of cheating
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-08
Updated: 2018-01-24
Packaged: 2019-02-12 02:11:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 18
Words: 61,676
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12949068
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sheksper/pseuds/Sheksper
Summary: “Wait, wait, please! I can’t get up; my leg is broken.”“You broke your leg?”“No! I didn’t break it! That imp broke it!”“An imp broke your leg…?”“Yeah, she was a green imp with glasses!”◊ ◊ ◊Keith avoids love like the plague, and Lance gives his love freely. With everything from their pasts holding them back, pursuing a relationship only ever seems like it'll end in pain. That is, until things start to change in their friendship, and they begin to realize that, sometimes, the risk of falling in love can be more than worth it.





	1. First Imp-pressions

**Author's Note:**

> Howdy y'all! I am back once again with another fic! This one isn't as sad as my last one, not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing. If you haven't read Qualia Under The Snow, I recommend it highly. I have my critiques and such, but overall, it's really good.  
> All of my chapters are between 3000 and 3999 words, never 2000 and never 4000.  
> Also, if the Attempted Rape/Non-Con tag is bothering you, just know that it's extremely brief, it's not initiated by any main characters, and nothing graphic is actually written, I just wanted to tag it so there's a heads up.  
> Voltron; Legendary Defender is owned by DreamWorks Animation TV, World Events Productions, and Studio Mir. Qualia Under the Snow is owned by Kii, Kanna.  
> Anyways, enjoy!

_“Shiro, why do you do that?” an eight-year-old Keith asked, patting the snowball he had created, smoothing the surface out. He glanced up from his work to stare at his brother through the snowflakes fluttering from the sky. There was a faraway look in Shiro’s eye as the older boy stared off into the middle distance, lost in thought._

_Registering Keith’s voice, Shiro turned, straightening his back up from where he had slouched against the side of the house. “Do what?” he asked, furrowing his eyebrows. Without thinking much about it, he brought the cigarette in his hand to his lips, taking a drag before pulling it away. Keith, watching in frustration, narrowed his eyes as his brother released the smoke into the air above them._

_“That.” Keith pointed. “Why do you smoke?”_

_Shiro glanced back at his cigarette in surprise for a moment, then he sighed, “I don’t know…”_

_“Do you like it?” Keith asked, returning to his snowball._

_Shiro huffed a laugh, his breath visible in the air as it swirled around and dissipated. “No, not really, Keith,” Shiro responded, smiling down at his younger brother._

_“Dad says he doesn’t like it either,” Keith muttered, snuggling farther into the red scarf wrapped around his neck. His nose felt cold in the icy air but it was difficult to speak with the fabric covering half his face._

_Nodding, Shiro watched Keith scoop handfuls of snow up with his mitts and press them into the lopsided snowball. He smiled sadly, “It’s a bad habit to get into, that’s for sure.”_

_Keith paused, inspecting Shiro through his long black bangs. “Can I try it too?” Keith asked, turning through the snow in his heavy boots to face Shiro._

_Shiro laughed, reaching out to ruffle the trapper cap adorning Keith’s head. “No, you’re too young.”_

_Keith adjusted his hat, shifting it around from where Shiro had messed it up. He grumbled, “You’re too young too.”_

_“I’m fifteen,” Shiro reasoned._

_“What about Acxa?” Keith interrogated, reaching out to pick up some more snow to pack onto the round ball he was forming._

_“She’s too young.”_

_Keith huffed, irritated. Dropping into the heap of untouched snow on Shiro’s other side, Keith bunched together a tiny snowball. He began rolling it through the snow, collecting as much as he could to form a second snowball. “Did dad tell you that?” he griped._

_Shiro, who was taking another drag of his cigarette, began shaking his head as he watched Keith play in the snow. “He didn’t, and you better not tell dad,” he said, gesturing to the cigarette._

_Keith glanced up at Shiro again. “Why?” he asked._

_His brother’s eyes narrowed as he stared at Keith. “Because…”_

_“Because you’re too young,” Keith grinned, smug at having caught Shiro._

_Shiro stared at Keith, unimpressed. “Nobody likes a smartass, Keith, it’s not cute.”_

_Keith laughed, continuing to roll his snowball through the sludge of the backyard. “I won’t tell dad,” he promised, giggling through the words._

_Shiro sighed in relief. “Thank you. And Keith,” from the snow, Keith met Shiro’s eye once again at his name, “don’t start smoking. You won’t like it either.”_

 

◊ ◊ ◊

 

Smoke plumed through the air beyond the threshold of the window frame. It shifted as it ascended, dissipating into the late-night air. The sun hadn’t gone completely over the horizon just yet and was still visible through the haze of the sunset. He watched it, content and yet unsatisfied all at once. Memories of when he was younger, hanging out in the snow with his brother like there wasn’t a single worry in the world, like the whole world would wait for them, those memories always hit a soft spot for him, bittersweet in the flavour they left behind on his tongue.

There was a jingle at the front door. It wasn’t a customer, the shop having closed around an hour ago, but he turned instinctively, knowing exactly who was there anyways. A short girl with wild blonde hair and wiry glasses strolled through the store, passing all the potted plants on shelves and the floor, ducking underneath hanging planters and signs. It was difficult to see the back of the store from all the way over there, but she knew her way around from how many times she had visited him. It also didn’t help that he liked to keep all the lights off once the store closed and let the only light be the sunset from the window.

“You need to clean up in here, Keith, I seriously almost tripped over that stack of fucking planters,” she complained, stumbling forward a bit and glaring back at her shoe. She flicked some dirt off her shoe, then continued to make her way to Keith in the corner window.

Keith watched her on the other side of the counter with a grin on his face, still sat in his stool by the window. “I haven’t moved them yet, but I’ll get to it, Pidge,” he called before taking another drag on his cigarette.

Pidge grumbled as she made the rest of her way over to the window. “These stupid fucking planters are always in the fucking way. You never move them,” she groused, irritated.

Keith hummed, “You kiss your mother with that mouth?”

“I steal your cigs with this mouth.” She glared, grabbing the cigarette right out of Keith’s hand – although he let her – and taking a puff. She blew the smoke out the window before handing it back to Keith.

Pidge was Keith’s best friend, always had been. Sure, he had other friends, but none of them connected to Keith in the same way Pidge did, like a puzzle piece to his life that he wasn’t even sure he was missing until the slot had been filled. They did everything together when they were younger; cryptid hunting, binge watching shows, shitty board games at three in the morning. Keith used to own a scooter that Pidge would ride on the back of when they went to the corner store to get ice cream. Not much had changed since they grew up though, they still did that, just on Keith’s motorbike instead.

For all her talents with computers, she couldn’t keep a plant alive to save her life. Keith, being the complete opposite in that regard, had tried to convince her that plants weren’t that difficult. It seemed, however, that Pidge just really didn’t have a green thumb. Whatever the opposite of a green thumb was, that was what Pidge had. But she wanted plants, not just for their benefits, but also to support Keith in his plant shop and understand better what it was that he did. Keith appreciated that on levels that he would never be able to express through words, so he expressed it through plants.

“I need some help with Rover,” she frowned. “He’s not working properly.”

Keith snorted, putting out his cigarette in the ashtray on the windowsill, “He’s a plant, Pidge, not a computer. He can’t just ‘not work properly.’ What’s the issue?” Keith rolled the sleeves of his sweatshirt up, cracking the joints of his hands before getting out of his stool.

“He’s covered in these little white things, I don’t know what they are, but they look bad,” Pidge supplied, looking worried.

Keith grimaced, “Yeah, that’s mildew.”

“Mildew?! Plants can get that?” she cried, following after Keith as he ducked and swerved through the shop until he reached the back room.

“Of course! I gave you a Caring For Your Plant pamphlet when you got him, didn’t you read it?” Keith furrowed his eyebrows as he paused walking to look her in the eye.

She stared at him wide-eyed. “Uh…”

“So, no,” Keith sighed. He turned back to the storage room and rummaged through some shelves. “How many leaves are affected?” he shouted out to her, still reaching up to a shelf.

Pidge called back from the doorframe, “All of them, I think…”

“All of them. Great,” Keith deadpanned. “Are any of them deformed or damaged in any way?”

“No, I don’t think so…” she answered, her voicing tinting with uncertainty.

Finally finding what he was looking for, Keith pulled the bottle off the shelf and made his way back to Pidge, who was still generally in the main shop. “Here,” he handed the bottle to her, “put that on Rover, he should be fine. If any of the leaves are damaged, you need to pull those off.”

“Pull them off?” Pidge echoed.

“Yeah.” Keith closed the door to the storage room, glancing over his shoulder when he addressed Pidge.

Her face scrunched up, bothered by the notion. “Won’t that hurt the plant?”

“Not if you’re gentle,” Keith assured.

Pidge stared down at the bottle in her hands, frowning. “Rover is the best plant a girl could ask for.”

Keith huffed a laugh, “Yeah, I understand that feeling. Don’t worry, Rover’ll be fine.” He patted a hand to her shoulder as he smiled down at her. She glanced up, meeting his eye, and smiled back at him, illuminated under the heavy purple light coming from the window.

“You’re going to come to the coffee shop tomorrow, right? It’s good to get out instead of being cooped up in here with your plants constantly,” she asked, giving him the same disapproving stare that Keith had grown used to from Shiro.

He stepped past her, clicking his tongue as he did. “I’ll be there, I promise. I’m out of coffee anyways,” Keith grumbled. He made his way to the desk in the middle of the store and picked up the stack of potters from the ground. Careful not to step on any of his plants, Keith hauled everything back to the shelf near the storage room and set the pots down. He wiped his hands off on his red apron, smearing dirt all over it.

“Good!” Pidge grinned. “I have some questions to ask you about my biology homework anyways, so this is perfect.” Her gaze drew to the window as the end of the sunset grew nearer. “It’s getting late and I don’t want to get stuck out in the snow,” Pidge muttered. “I’ll see you tomorrow then, Keith!” She hugged him briefly, which he returned. She grimaced at the dirt that was transferred onto her green hoodie.Then, she wandered her way back through the store until she reached the front entrance.

“Stay safe!” Keith called.

“I will!” Pidge shouted back in an exasperated tone. The door jingled again as she opened it, then she was gone.

Keith stood in the middle of his darkened shop, his hands shoved deep into the pockets of his black skinny jeans. He sighed, content. Keith didn’t leave his shop a whole lot, mostly because his work and his house were in the same building, one on top of the other, but also just because Keith didn’t have a whole lot of places to go. He’d go to the coffee shop, the library, the corner store, and the park, but that was about it. And he was happy, he knew his friends were worried that he was too reclusive, but Keith was happy. Well, maybe not happy, but content.

He glanced over at his cigarette in the ashtray by the open window, debating whether he wanted to go to sleep just yet or not, when a loud clambering out front of his store drew his attention in. Keith paused, listening to the sounds of someone stumbling around, then a thud as though they were collapsing. There was a breath of silence. Keith waited, but no more sounds came from beyond the door. Slowly, Keith wandered over to the door, ducking under planters and stepping around shelves, but never taking his eyes off the door. He pulled a knife out of his back pocket, just a little switchblade, but it was enough to protect him should it come to that.

Keith gripped the doorknob as quietly as he was able, moving a little bit closer to the door to better hear any noises on the other side. Nothing. Keith turned the handle, ready for whatever may be on the other side. He flung the door open.

Rather than a serial killer like he – foolishly – suspected it to be, or a robber, or anything of the sort, there was a man in a giant blue coat laying on the steps in front of his shop, breathing heavily. Hair the colour of rich chocolate curled around his ears, framing his face in a way that didn’t take away from his face too much. He was objectively pretty, a gentle face with soft features, which matched his lanky build.

Panicked, Keith immediately put the knife away, dropping down into a crouch next to the man. “Are you alright?” he frantically asked, reaching out for the man’s arm. “What happened? Can you hear me?”

The man’s eyes opened, hazy and unseeing as they met Keith’s worried gaze. A grin broke out across his face and he pressed his wiry arms out beneath him. “Hey, there!” he slurred lazily. “The name’s Lance.” His eyes were pretty too, a bright shade of blue, like the sky.

Keith watched in confusion for a moment, unsure of what he had just witnessed. One moment the man looked distressed and in need of help, the next he was languidly winking at Keith in a dazed stupor. Then it hit him, the smell of alcohol. It wasn’t too strong, but it was there, coming off the man in waves. Keith’s face scrunched up in disgust and he stood back up. “Go home, we’re closed,” he ordered shortly. Keith turned to go back inside, leaving the man to stay out in the biting cold, drunk and alone, when Lance’s whining pulled him back.

“Wait, wait, please!” Lance pleaded. “I can’t get up; my leg is broken.”

Keith raised an eyebrow. “You broke your leg?” he clarified skeptically.

“No!” Lance argued, far too loud for Keith’s liking. “I didn’t break it! That imp broke it!”

“An imp broke your leg…?” Keith really wanted to just go back inside.

“Yeah, she was a green imp with glasses!” Lance angrily pointed down the road.

It clicked in Keith’s mind then, that he was probably talking about Pidge. She would kick a guy’s leg in if he was hitting on her, Keith had seen her do it, and this drunk guy seemed particularly keen on flirtation. His leg probably wasn’t broken though.

Keith sighed, hating himself for what he was about to do, but knowing that he couldn’t just leave him there in the snow, “Alright… C’mon, let’s get you up…”

He reached a hand down to Lance, who readily took it with a bright smile. Keith leaned down, allowing for Lance to wrap his arm around the offered shoulder and heave himself upwards. Lance wasn’t that heavy, especially for Keith. “You’re so strong!” Lance grinned, staring Keith in the eyes. Their faces were centimetres apart, and Keith couldn’t help the way his face heated up under Lance’s attention.

“You just don’t weigh anything,” he grumbled, turning towards the shop. Lance laughed in response.

They waddled along through the plant shop until they got to the stairs which led to the second floor. It was a lot more difficult to get Lance to figure out how steps worked than Keith had the patience for, but eventually they made it. Keith unlocked the door, kicking it open enough for them to fit through.

It wasn’t a very big place, but there was a kitchen, a bedroom, a living room, and a bathroom. He sat Lance down onto the couch in the living room carefully, making sure that he wasn’t about to throw up before backing away. “Do you have anyone that I can call for you?” he asked, still slightly irritated.

“No,” Lance answered airily, sliding down the couch until his face pressed into the cushion.

Keith frowned at him. He was about to complain, tell him that he couldn’t stay there on Keith’s couch, but something about the way he snuggled up and smiled happily into the couch cushion reminded Keith of a kitten, and he just couldn’t bring himself to kick the man out.

Keith sighed, “Do you want some water?”

Lance cracked an eye open, smiling wider. “No, I don’t think I can drink anything else.”

“Alright,” Keith nodded. He stepped away from the couch to return to his room, reminding himself that he was an idiot for letting this stranger into his house and leaving him unattended while he went to go sleep. He was going to get robbed or killed, or something! Keith berated himself as he trudged over to his bedroom. He would have to lock the door to his room, that was for sure. Maybe he could call Pidge and tell her what Lance looked like in case he was kidnapped and couldn’t give the police any leads himself.

A sleepy voice broke through his thoughts, “You’re so kind to me. Thank you.” Lance’s eyes were still closed when Keith glanced back at him, but there was a brilliant blush across his face – most likely from the alcohol, Keith thought – and the softest smile that Keith had ever seen. Whether he was a serial killer or not suddenly didn’t matter, Keith’s annoyance seemed to melt, replaced with a strange feeling of warmth.

He didn’t answer Lance, instead turning to wander back into his own room. The door lock was forgotten as he undid his apron, tossed it onto a hook by the door, yanked off his jeans and sweatshirt, and let himself fall into bed with only his boxers on. He shuffled up under the covers, reaching around blearily in the darkness until he could find the switch for his electric blanket. Then, once more before he fell asleep, Keith glanced to the window of his bedroom and watched the snow fluttering down.

“Fuck…” he muttered, “I left the downstairs window open…” Then he was out like a light.


	2. Purely Plantonic

Lance slowly regained consciousness, his face still pressed into his pillow. He groaned in the back of his throat, attempting to will away the pounding headache in his brain. One eye opened, taking in the unfamiliar surroundings. Then his other eye opened. He squinted at the coffee table in front of him, never having seen it before. In fact, he’d never seen anything in the vicinity before. There was a kitchen on the other side of the small living room, both empty and devoid of any noise.

Lance struggled to remember where he was, how he had gotten to his couch he was currently sleeping on. He could vaguely recall hitting on a short girl outside of a flower shop and getting kicked in the knee. There was a boy too, a really cute boy. He may have worked at the flower shop, Lance wasn’t sure. The boy took him inside, that was what had happened. It came back to him slowly, as though it were a dream and each new bit of information led him to another development.

He had fallen asleep on the cute boy’s couch. What was his name? Lance wasn’t sure. A complete stranger had let him stay on their couch overnight, and while he was drunk too! Lance was a handful when he was drunk, he knew that. There was no doubt in his mind that the guy wouldn’t have wanted Lance in his house while Lance was drunk, but there he was, in the guy’s house, still wearing his heavy winter coat and everything.

Footsteps sounded behind Lance’s head. He sat up, searching for the source, only to find a closed door on the other wall. The handle turned, revealing the same beautiful boy that Lance had just been remembering. And oh man, Lance’s memory did not serve him well, because this boy was not only cute, he was stunning.

Even in the morning, with his long hair a mess, it still shaped around his head in a way that appeared purposeful, like a model. His dark eyes locked with Lance’s, even through the strands of bangs shielding his face. He had a strong jaw, a beautifully structured face, and, based on the rolled-up sleeves of his crimson-coloured hoodie, was well built.

He stepped into the room, closing the door to – what Lance assumed to be – his bedroom behind him, still making eye contact with Lance. “Mornin’,” he greeted groggily. Lance’s heart palpitated at his voice.

“Hi,” Lance replied, feeling his face heat up. This model of a human had just gotten up looking ready for a photoshoot, and here was Lance, hungover and about ready to collapse back into the couch.

He wandered by Lance’s couch on his way to the front door, dropping a box onto the table as he passed. “Don’t stay too long, I have places to go today,” he grumbled.

Lance twisted around on the couch as he passed before glancing down to the box on the coffee table. It was a small unopened box of aspirin tablets. The door at the other end of the room clicked open and Lance immediately glanced up to see the man leaving. He panicked slightly, not really knowing what to do in this situation.

Stumbling, Lance managed to stand, although it was a struggle with the relentless throbbing in his head. He groaned, grabbing the aspirins off the table and staggering to the kitchen. Glancing back to the door, Lance wondered if the guy would mind him stealing a cup of water quickly. Probably not, considering he gave Lance the medicine at all. Lance rummaged around carelessly through the cupboards. Normally, he would be more conscious about being in someone else’s house, but his head was killing him and he really just wanted to go to the bathroom.

Finally, Lance found the cups. He filled one with water from the sink, rapidly opened the package of aspirin, and downed one of the pills. After emptying the cup of water, Lance took a few deep breaths, then placed the cup by the sink and wandered to one of the doors he hadn’t seen the contents of. To his gratitude, it was a bathroom. Lance stared at his reflection, wincing at his sunken appearance. The skin care routine he was so used to had been forgotten that night, and it clearly showed. Lance sighed.

Once he was done, he forced himself out the door of the apartment and down the stairs. Just as suspected, the house was above the flower shop that Lance had fallen in front of the night prior. That guy really did work there then. Speak of the devil.

“Oh, good, you’re here. I was about to go check and make sure you didn’t fall back asleep,” the man was just adjusting a scarf around his neck as he noticed Lance trudging down the stairs.

“Yeah, no, I’m fine. Sorry about that, by the way…” Lance chuckled, going for his most charming smile.

The man grunted, “Don’t worry about it.”

Lance shuffled his feet awkwardly, willing his voice to be steady as he spoke again, “So, uh, I was a little, y’know, out of it last night, didn’t catch your name. Mine’s La–”

“Lance, I know,” the man interrupted. “I’m Keith.”

Smiling nervously, Lance continued on, as bright and charming as he could, “Nice to meet you, Keith! And thank you for not just leaving me outside, you really didn’t have to do that, but it means a lot.”

Keith furrowed his eyebrows, his gaze dropping to his black boots, “I couldn’t just leave you there...”

Lance’s heart jumped slightly as he watched Keith’s hair tumble around his neck. “What can I do?” he blurted.

Keith lifted his head again, confused and taken aback. “What?”

“To repay you, I mean,” Lance laughed weakly, his face heating up in embarrassment.

A blank look overtook Keith’s face then as he stared at Lance. “You don’t… need to…” he hesitantly answered.

“You saved my life, man, I have to do something!” Lance argued.

“I didn’t save your life,” Keith grumbled, almost embarrassed in the way he glanced back into his flower shop.

“Dinner! Would you let me make you dinner tonight? At my place, that is,” Lance bit his lip.

There was a pause where Keith just stared around his store, seemingly thinking it over. Or debating how to reject Lance right then and there, Lance wasn’t sure. His heart felt heavy in his chest and his ears burned.

“Alright…” Keith answered cautiously. “Yeah, okay. That’s fine. Where do you live?”

Lance’s heart leaped then, instantly reviving itself and returning to life. “Just over across the street!” Lance pointed in the general direction through the window, Keith following his line of sight.

“Just over there…?” Keith asked, his mood suddenly turning irritated.

“Yeah,” Lance nodded, smiling.

“Why didn’t you just go home last night?!" Keith stared at him incredulously.

At that, Lance laughed, “I just said you didn’t have to take me in! I just moved in a month ago actually.”

Keith groaned and rolled his eyes, “Dinner better be really good to make up for this.”

Lance couldn’t help the excitement he felt. “Nothing but the best!” he promised. He reached for the door handle of the shop entrance, opening it with a swooping motion before dramatically gesturing to the frozen outdoors. “After you!”

Keith glared at him briefly, although there was a hint of amusement in the quirk of his lip, and he stepped outside. Lance followed behind him, closing the door. Keith paused to lock the place up, but Lance hopped down the steps and began making his way across the street to his house.

“See you later, Keith!” he called.

“Lance,” Keith’s voice sounded, drawing Lance’s attention back to him at the seriousness in his tone. Their eyes met through the fluttering snow, a genuine concern playing at the edges of Keith’s expression. “You should be more careful when you flirt,” he warned. Then he shoved his gloved hands deep into his grey coat and wandered down the street in the direction of the town.

Lance watched him leave. It wasn’t until he turned a corner out of sight that Lance finally turned and continued his trek back home, thinking about Keith the entire way there. A realization hit him; he didn’t fucking have anything to cook.

 

◊ ◊ ◊

 

The door jingled as it was opened, signalling Keith’s arrival. The barista behind the counter glanced up, ready to greet him with a friendly smile, but she cut herself off as she realized who it was.

“Keith! There you are!” she exclaimed. “I was beginning to think you weren’t going to show up.” Her smile was blinding as she greeted Keith, her long, white hair tied up in a ponytail which trailed along behind as she moved.

Keith stomped his feet on the mat at the front door before yanking his scarf down and away from his face as he approached the counter. “Allura, hey!” he grinned. “Pidge came by last night to pester me, so I had no choice, really,” he joked.

Allura laughed, grabbing a cup from the stack behind her and preparing a drink. “That sounds about right. She should be here soon, actually. She just got caught up; roads are icy. Hopefully you didn’t have too much trouble getting here?” she smiled gently as she readied Keith’s drink.

Keith’s mind instantly trailed back to Lance and his bright eyes as he paused in the middle of the street right before they parted ways. “No, no trouble,” Keith replied casually, hoping he didn’t seem too distracted.

If he seemed like he had something else on his mind, Allura didn’t notice. She handed Keith the cardboard cup at the end of the counter by the cash register. “Your usual,” she nodded. Keith handed her the money in exchange, not needing to hear the total since it was the same thing he ordered every time. She returned the change to him, which he deposited into the tip jar next to the register.

Rounding the counter, Keith sat at the elevated round table directly next to the counter where he could still talk to Allura. She was very good company, Keith had found. When Allura had first moved to Lionsville, Indiana, Keith hadn’t wanted to become her friend. Not because he didn’t like her or he was being rude, it was just difficult for him to strike up conversations with people and to make connections. His only friend for a long time had been Pidge, who, thankfully, was much more willing to make friends than Keith was.

So, seeing as Pidge was basically a cyborg of a person who ran only on caffeine, she spent a lot of time in the café where Allura worked, and had, as a result, become her friend. It was only a matter of time before she got Keith and Allura to meet, thus, making their small three-person friend group. Pidge liked to refer to their group as the BLT squad. If asked, she would explain that Allura was the bacon because she was obsessively loved, Keith was the lettuce because he was basically a plant-person anyway, and Pidge was the tomato because she was an acquired taste.

All in all, Keith was grateful for Pidge’s friendship and the friendships she helped Keith make.

Speaking of which, right as Keith settled into the stool against the wall, the front door jangled again and a shorter girl with snow covered hair and a disgruntled face came stomping into the shop. Her puffy green jacket looked more like a lifejacket than a winter coat, but at least it kept her warm. Keith still snickered as she waddled up to the front counter though.

“I can’t stand all this snow nonsense for another second. How do I sell my soul to become a crunchy leaf?” she grumbled angrily, ripping off her gloves and stuffing them into her pockets.

Allura smiled at her sympathetically, although Keith could see the amusement in her eyes as she mixed up a cup of coffee for Pidge. “Ask Keith, he’s the plant man,” she joshed.

Keith took a sip of his coffee, letting the hot liquid warm him up from the inside out. He hummed in gratitude before meeting Pidge’s eye. “Sorry, Pidge, crunchy leaf season has passed,” he shrugged.

“Does nothing good ever happen?” she dramatically sighed. “Oh, hey, Allura, can you add mini marshmallows to that?” Pidge pointed to the jar, reaching over the counter in her sudden excitement.

Allura paused, staring at Pidge as though she’d gone mad. “In your coffee?” she raised an eyebrow.

“All the fun of being a kid again, but instead of having hot chocolate, I’m able to actually stay awake,” Pidge answered, still grinning at the marshmallow jar.

“’Being a kid again,’ as if you’re not a kid still,” Keith mumbled into his coffee cup.

Pidge whipped around to point an accusatory finger at him, “You better watch yourself.” A quirk of her lip threatened a smile but she held out, maintaining her aura of irritation. Keith just snorted. Allura slid Pidge’s drink across the counter, taking Pidge’s money in return. Pidge made her way over to table where Keith was, taking a seat next to him, but still facing so that Allura could join in the conversation.

“So, Keith, how’re you enjoying the twenty-first century?” Pidge ribbed, smirking at him as she raised her cup to her lips.

“What do you mean?” Keith frowned, confused.

Pidge swallowed a sip of marshmallow laced coffee before speaking again, “Well, you know, since you’ve trapped yourself in your plant store for the past three hundred years, I just figured you’d be impressed with how far humanity has evolved.”

Keith’s face dropped into an unimpressed glare, ignoring Allura’s snort behind him. “Haha. That’s real hilarious, Pidge,” he deadpanned. “Look, I’m here now, just like I promised, no need to harass me.”

Allura, having no customers to attend to, leaned over the short wall separating the table from the counter with a grin, “And we’re very glad you’ve decided to join the realm of the living, Keith.” Pidge nodded, smiling.

“I get it, I get it, I spend a lot of time with my plants. Can you lay off now?” Keith groaned.

“Come now, Keith! We just don’t want you to be a recluse!” Allura reached over, gently pushing Keith’s shoulder.

Pidge hummed around her cup of coffee, quickly placing it back on the table. “It’s true. You may love your plants, but they can never love you back,” she said pointedly.

“I could say the same thing about your computers,” Keith countered, staring hard at Pidge.

Pidge paused for a moment, meeting Keith’s gaze with a realization in her eyes. “You take that back… Beezer loves me…” she murmured.

“What we’re trying to say is that you should put yourself out there more! Connect, make some friends, get a girlfriend,” Allura smiled kindly, urging Keith with her soft expression.

Keith took a sip of his coffee, then sighed, “It’s so much work though… Just small talk and shallow, pointless conversations. Nothing of substance,” Keith whined. “Plants aren’t like that. Plants are quiet, calm, and they don’t wanna talk about how their new job promotion might mean they have to pack up and move away to Wyoming by the end of the year even though their wife doesn’t want to because she just bought a year-long gym membership and it’s non-refundable and non-transferrable.” With a dead look in his eye, Keith took a relaxing gulp of coffee.

Pidge and Allura studied him with concerned – and slightly disturbed – expressions. “That’s extremely specific, are you okay?” Pidge asked, her eyebrows furrowing.

“People are so chatty while they’re buying plants,” Keith mumbled, letting his eyes close.

“Well, if you want, I could get you a date with one of my friends. She’s very kind,” Allura suggested.

Keith narrowed his eyebrows. “I’m good, thanks,” he said sarcastically.

Allura tilted her head as a gesture of acceptance, “If you change your mind, the offer stands.”

Pidge stretched her arms over her head, the puffy jacket she was crammed into shuffling loudly as she did. “Just don’t end up marrying a plant, I’m not spending money on a wedding gift for that,” she complained with an exhausted sigh.

Keith clicked his tongue, “I’m not going to marry a _plant,_ Pidge.”

“I wouldn’t be surprised if you did,” she said under her breath. “Can you at least try to stop being a hermit and get a date? Please?”

“Hey, Allura,” Keith turned to her. “Wanna go on a date later?”

Allura looked taken aback, staring wide-eyed at Keith for a moment before sympathetically smiling. “I’m sorry, Keith, I only see you as a friend…”

Keith shrugged, turning back to Pidge, “Oh well, I tried. Guess I’m meant to be alone forever.” He gave the most sarcastically pained expression he could muster.

“Why do you vex me like this?” Pidge glared.

The door to the shop jingled as a customer stepped in from the cold. Allura instantly straightened and returned to her spot at the cash register. She greeted the patron, giving off her most radiant smile.

Keith took a deep breath, taking in the scent of the coffee and sighing as it calmed him. He thought back to all the plants he had to water when he got home and how much would have to be quickly cleaned before he opened up his shop again tomorrow when his day off ended. It wasn’t too much work and Keith enjoyed being around his plants too, so he wasn’t complaining, but he still had dinner to think about.

Lance had invited him over and he had agreed. The more he ran that sentence through his mind, the more he realized how ridiculous it was. He didn’t know Lance, Lance was just some guy who collapsed on his doorstep while drunk one night. But, on the other hand, Keith had sort of just dragged Lance into his house and nothing bad had happened. Maybe dinner wouldn’t be that bad. Maybe this would work out and he would be able to connect with Lance on some level. That would satisfy Pidge and Allura, and he’d make a new friend. A win for everyone.

And if it didn’t work out, then hey, Keith got a free dinner. Taking one more sip of his coffee, he turned back to Pidge to continue their conversation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lionsville, Indiana... Like Zionsville, Indiana... but with Lions.  
> I'm so clever.


	3. You're a UFHoe

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> An entire chapter of Lance and Keith bonding over Keith's truther mentality.

“New Roswell evidence? Are you serious?” Keith muttered to himself excitedly, flipping through the newest edition of UFO Activity; Aliens Revealed. It wasn’t every day that Keith came to the bookstore, but he had heard through the grapevine that there was going to be a new book release, and he just had to pick it up on his way home from the café. It was getting later, but he still had more than enough time to browse before he assumed Lance would be expecting him.

Keith skimmed the pictures, quickly reading through the various information blurbs. He was completely enthralled by all the new additions to the case, developing his own theories as he read, his mind going wild.

There were many skeptics of the Roswell incident, but Keith didn’t understand how. Clearly, the evidence was all there, it even had its own coverup from the government, and yet people still tried to convince themselves it was nothing more than a weather balloon. The military even called for the headline to be released that they had uncovered a fly saucer, what more proof was there than that? Sure, there was no other information included, but they quickly changed their story afterwards. If that didn’t scream suspicious, then what did, honestly?

“Weather balloon, my ass…” Keith mumbled, glaring at the page.

“Ooh, alien hunting,” a sudden voice interrupted Keith’s thought, startling him, but not enough to make him jump.

Turning to face them with a glare, Keith found himself staring into the same ocean eyes he had met earlier that morning. “Lance?” Keith furrowed his eyebrows.

“The one and only!” Lance grinned, punctuating it with a flourishing hand gesture.

Keith stared at him for a moment, then glanced around the bookstore full of empty aisles. “Are you stalking me…?” he angrily questioned.

“No!” Lance quickly answered. “Well, not really… I saw you come in here on my way by, so I guess a little bit… It’s not creepy, I swear…” Lance at least had the decency to look sheepish, a light pink dusting his cheeks as he glanced around the bookshelves awkwardly. “You’re still going to come over for dinner, right?” he laughed nervously.

Keith studied him, all anger seeping out of him slowly. Lance wasn’t a bad guy, Keith could tell that. He was just a friendly drunk guy who wanted to return the kind favour that Keith had given to him. “Yeah, I am,” he nodded, relaxing a little bit.

Lance instantly brightened, “Great! It’s getting late so we should head back soon!” He began to step away from the aisle of books, gesturing to the front entrance with his thumb, the same goofy grin still on his face.

“Wait, what?” Keith held up the book he still had in his hand. “I haven’t even bought anything yet,” he argued.

“Then I’ll wait for you outside!” Lance called as he hurried away, making great distance with his ridiculously long legs.

Keith stood up on his tiptoes to watch over the shelf as Lance rushed away. He couldn’t help the way his lip quirked up at the way Lance leaped over the small stack of shopping baskets stored by the front door. Settling back down on his feet, Keith stared down at his book. There was no way he was going to be able to sleep if he didn’t find out the new Roswell information, that was for sure. And with that in mind, Keith hiked the book up under his arm and headed to the cash register.

After waiting in the absurdly long line – seriously, didn’t people have things to be doing on a Saturday night? – Keith eventually was able to pay for his book and head out the front entrance doors. The second he stepped out into the cold, he spotted Lance’s blue jacket. The taller boy was leaning up against a wall, flirting with some girl. She was pretty enough; long, brown hair and dressed stylishly, yet appropriately for the weather. The girl was smiling, clearly into whatever Lance was saying. Keith stepped off to the side with his back to one of the display windows and waited, watching with interest as Lance’s flirty grin quickly shifted into a look of panic as the girl’s delicate hand reached over to stroke down his arm while she laughed.

That was odd. Keith wasn’t one to flirt, he never had been, but he was certain that her reaction to Lance’s flirting was a positive one. If Lance played his cards right, he could get her number. And yet, Lance took a hesitant half-step back and yanked his arm away from the girl, who was now looking quite concerned and confused. He offered her a nervously apologetic smile, his eyes scanning the crowd frantically before connecting with Keith’s. Lance’s face relaxed with relief, causing Keith to be even more perplexed than before, and waved the girl a hasty goodbye. Then, Lance raced over to Keith, carefully keeping his back to the girl the entire time.

“Hey, hi, you’re all done, that’s great,” Lance rapidly said, directing a tight smile at Keith.

“Are you alright?” Keith asked as he glanced over Lance’s shoulder to see the girl frowning in his direction.

Lance subtly stepped in the way. “Yeah, of course.”

“What happened over there…?” Keith met his eye, concern seeping into his tone.

“Oh, nothing,” Lance reached a hand up to rub at his neck anxiously. He smiled as brightly as usual, almost as though he hadn’t even been worried about anything to begin with, still kneading his neck. A red mark was forming where his hand was working and Keith’s eyes were drawn to it, his forehead creasing in worry.

Keith grunted, unconvinced. Turning away, Keith began heading down the street with the plastic bag from the bookstore still in his hand. Lance quickly jogged along to keep up before falling into step next to Keith. “What happened to being more careful when you’re flirting?” he quipped.

“Ah, Keith, Keith, Keith,” Lance shook his head, laughing, “the ladies love me! And there are just so many beautiful girls around, how could I possibly just let them pass me by?” There was a self-assured grin on his face as he ducked his head to stare up at Keith.

“You had no trouble letting that one back there pass you by,” Keith pointed out.

“No, she was… not my type, I guess…” Lance cringed. He quickly recovered his easy-going demeanor, “That’s fine though. I mean, there are a lot of fish in the sea, and there are a ton of seas, and some of those seas don’t even have fish!”

Keith couldn’t help the confused snort he made, glancing over at Lance out of the corner of his eye to see the way he grinned at the darkening sky.

“Anyway, that’s not why we’re here! So, about dinner, hope you’re hungry because I’m going to be making _pollo asado al ajillo!”_ Lance clapped his hands together.

Keith frowned, “I don’t know what that is.”

“Roasted garlic chicken, but it’s better!” Lance laughed. “It’ll only take an hour or so to make, but I think you’ll like it.”

“Sounds good,” Keith agreed, unable to keep his smile down.

They hadn’t had far to walk, just a couple blocks through the soft snow from the bookstore to Lance’s apartment across the street from Keith’s shop. As they neared, Keith could see that the lower part of the shop was a pharmacy. Lance didn’t exactly look like someone who would own a pharmacy. That wasn’t to say he looked stupid, he was just young, mid to late twenties at most. It was hard for Keith to believe that Lance would be able to get a pharmaceutical degree and still have enough to buy a shop to practice in. Maybe his parents owned it?

“Are you a pharmacist?” Keith absently asked as Lance unlocked the door leading to the stairs for the upper floor.

“Hmm?” Lance glanced back, following Keith’s gaze to the sign overtop the pharmacy. “Oh! No, no. I’m just renting the apartment above. I’m actually a waiter at The Blue Spring Diner.” The door gave way as Lance turned the key and pushed.

Keith hummed, “I know the place.”

They stepped inside, going up the metal stairs until they reached Lance’s apartment. Keith still had his book on him, having decided that it would be a waste of time to return it home first, even if he did live right across the street. Once inside, Keith didn’t even try to be subtle as he peered around the room. It was roughly similar to Keith’s own place, except much smaller and more cluttered. It wasn’t messy clutter, it just seemed that Lance owned a lot more items than Keith did.

Shelves with framed pictures nestled in between rows of books and knick-knacks. The fridge in the kitchen had more pictures on it, some sticky notes with reminders, a calendar for the month with red strikes marking the days passed. There weren’t many cupboards in the kitchen, and as a result, a lot of Lance’s pantry foods were settled out on the counter in the open. The coat rack by the front door was filled with various jackets, scarves, gloves, and hats. Even the curtains over the window were colourful and bright, similar to Lance himself.

All in all, Keith rather liked Lance’s apartment.

Lance gave him the grand tour, not that there was a lot to tour in the first place, but he really made a show out of everything. They ended on Lance’s bedroom where he had a television set up with an entertainment set stocked full of video games, movies, and tv series season disk sets. Lance decided that was probably the most ideal place to eat in the apartment since the table was rather clunky and awkward, and also because the television was in his bedroom. Keith was fine with that, especially so since he wasn’t good with conversation and having a show to fall back on when their chats wore thin was a fantastic idea.

Once Keith was settled and had assured Lance that there wasn’t anything else he needed, Lance hurried off to go make roasted chicken.

 

◊ ◊ ◊

 

“Okay, that’s the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard!” Keith threw his hands up in the air, nearly knocking over the half empty can of Pabst Blue Ribbon he had been drinking throughout the night.

“How is it ridiculous?! They were testing equipment and one of their tests happened to crash in Roswell, it’s not evidence of alien activity!” Lance countered from where he was sprawled out on the floor with his legs laying on the bed. “It was a weather balloon!”

“A military officer literally said it wasn’t from this planet!” Keith exclaimed.

Lance laughed pretentiously, “Yeah, and the rest of the military released another statement saying that that officer was wrong.”

Keith scoffed, “Uh, yeah! Because it was a coverup!”

“Uh, no!” Lance imitated. “Because the officer was delusional!”

“He was trained!”

“He was a boob!”

Keith gave Lance an expression as though he were the biggest idiot that there ever was – although it was upside down from Lance’s point of view. “Weather balloons aren’t made from metals that don’t even exist on _Earth,_ Lance!” he argued, his tone disbelieving.

“How the hell do you know it wasn’t made on Earth?” Lance questioned.

Keith clicked his tongue, reaching over to grab the book he had purchased at the bookstore for the billionth time that night.

When they had first started eating Lance’s perfectly prepared _pollo asado al ajillo,_ the conversation had been a bit stunted, almost awkward. Lance had tried his best to drum something up, and while everything they did talk about was intriguing and interesting, the conversation would always hit a rough patch and taper off. It seemed that Keith wasn’t the greatest at thinking of things to say, so Lance had to really try hard to find stuff to talk about, which was amazing in itself since Lance could talk about nothing for hours at a time.

So, Lance, being as intrigued about the stars as he was, had questioned Keith about the alien book. One might say that was a mistake with how riled up Keith got, but Lance counted it as a win. The argument about the Roswell UFO scare had been going on for a while and lasted well after they had both finished their meals. At some point or another, Lance had brought out the beers, which was another potential mistake from the way that Keith just got more into the alien debate.

Lance actually enjoyed sitting there with Keith, lightly buzzed as they argued about aliens. He liked the way that Keith waved his arms around when he thought that Lance was being particularly unreasonable, and the way his eyebrows were so ridiculously expressive when he wasn’t using them to glare at Lance, and the way he would pause mid sentence to take a sip of his Pabst when his throat got dry from talking more than he was used to before picking up his thought right where he left off. Lance also really loved the way that Keith’s lip quirked up in a smile as he tried not to laugh while speaking whenever he noticed Lance making goofy faces at him.

Keith was really fun, even at his most awkward.

“Right there, do you see that?” Keith pointed, shoving the book at Lance so he could see. “That is the statement from Major Jesse Marcel – the intelligence officer who had been there to investigate the original wreckage – on the metal that the ‘weather balloon’ was made of.” He made sure to include air quotations so that Lance knew he wasn’t convinced.

_“’It felt like you had nothing in your hands; it wasn’t any thicker than the foil out of a pack of cigarettes, but the thing about it that got me is that you couldn’t even bend it, you couldn’t dent it, even a sledgehammer would bounce off of it. I knew that I had never seen anything like that before,’”_ Lance read. He squinted at the page and then looked past it to squint at Keith. “And you believe the words of some guy?”

“He’s not _some guy,_ he’s an intelligence officer with the military. He knows a thing or two about aircraft material,” Keith huffed, pulling the book away.

Lance shuffled around on the floor until he was on his side, propping his head up on his hand with his feet still on top of his bed. The position wasn’t comfortable, stretching and folding his torso in awkward ways, but Lance ignored it. “Keith, the military even released a statement that it was a weather balloon!” he reminded.

“It was a coverup,” Keith frowned.

Lance pointed a finger at him, “Yes, it was a coverup for Project Mogul.”

“You can’t claim it’s aliens, then claim it’s a weather balloon, then claim it’s a coverup weather balloon, and still expect me to believe that you’re telling me the truth,” Keith deadpanned, glaring pointedly at Lance.

“Well, maybe if you took your tinfoil hat off for a second, you’d see the truth,” Lance shrugged – tried to anyway. “It was a government issued test for weather balloon-like equipment that recorded sounds from far away and they were using them to make sure the Soviet Union wasn’t blowing shit up, okay, Keith? There were reports– stop making that pissy face at me, there were reports that the debris in the ranch matched the materials used for Project Mogul,” Lance concluded, shifting around on the floor so he could properly lean back and stare smugly at Keith.

“Do you know how far the coverup extended?” Keith asked, a smarmy look on his face to challenge Lance’s smugness. He began listing off items, using his fingers to emphasize his points, “Details about the crash site, the materials found in the debris, what the actual space craft was, and some witnesses even say there were remains of alien lifeforms.” Keith sat back, staring at Lance as if he had just checkmated him.

Lance took a sip of his Corona before putting it back on the nightstand. It was a little warm, but Lance was too busy with his debate to really care. “Alien lifeforms? Yeah, I’m sure. Give me that,” Lance grumbled, grabbing the book from Keith’s lap to flip through the pages. “Look, right here,” he jabbed a finger into the book, “the government was testing parachutes with human-like dummies, that’s probably what they saw.”

Keith laughed, not an amused one but a condescending one, “Those tests happened years _after_ the Roswell case.”

“Well, people’s accounts of things get muddled, they probably just can’t remember what happened and when it happened and what they did or didn’t see,” Lance responded, waving a hand in the air as though he was physically waving Keith’s argument away.

“Bullshit, you don’t forget something like a UFO crashing into your ranch,” Keith huffed.

“Yeah but there would be records of what people saw stashed somewhere, Keith,” Lance countered.

A calm look crossed Keith’s face and he began nodding his head in agreement, which, of course, made Lance instantly suspicious. “No, you’re absolutely right, there would be reports,” Keith replied. He grabbed his Pabst and took a long sip before turning back to Lance. “Except they were literally all destroyed!”

Lance shook his head, “Okay, that’s a little…”

“Sketchy?” Keith filled in.

“Sketchy, yeah… That’s a little sketch…” Lance glared at Keith, not wanting to give in but having nothing good to use as an argument.

“Alien coverup,” Keith hissed under his breath, completely serious.

Lance furrowed his eyebrows at Keith, “Let’s just agree to disagree.”

Keith grunted in response. Lance stood, stretching his legs and arms before dropping onto his bed like a sack of bricks. He stared at Keith from where his face was pressed into the mattress. Keith’s eyes were trained on the window. Silence settled around them, allowing Lance to finally realize just how tired he really was.

“Mind if I smoke?” Keith mumbled out the question, gesturing vaguely to the window he had been watching.

“Go ahead,” Lance answered softly. He glanced down to the nightstand. “You can use my can as an ashtray, I don’t have a real one.”

Keith hummed his gratitude. Lance noticed that about Keith; he made small noises in place of actual words sometimes. It was fine with Lance. He watched as Keith pulled a package of cigarettes out of his pocket, followed by a lighter, and set them on the windowsill. A rush of cool air entered the room when Keith opened the window, sprinkling a light layer of snow over his shirt. He didn’t seem to mind though, choosing to pick a cigarette out of the box and light it. The smoke flowed with the winter wind and Keith stared blindly into the night.

“You don’t look like someone who smokes,” Lance commented, snuggling deeper into his bed as the cold air began to reach out for him.

Keith nodded once before removing his cigarette from his mouth and breathing a plume of smoke out the window. “I get that a lot,” he replied, glancing over at Lance.

The television was still playing in the background, although lowly since Lance had turned it down at the beginning of their Roswell debate. He let his eyes wander away from Keith to the bright colours flashing across the screen. Whatever the show was, Lance couldn’t tell, not that it mattered anyways.

“That girl…” Keith began, no longer looking at Lance, but instead focusing on something outside. His voice sounded tired and distant, as though he were speaking without thinking about what he was saying. “The one by the bookstore and my friend the other night, Pidge. Do you do that a lot?”

Lance squinted in confusion, mulling over Keith’s words and struggling to remember anyone named Pidge. “Do what?”

“Flirt,” Keith filled in. “Do you flirt for no reason a lot?”

“Yeah, I guess I do.”

Keith didn’t turn his head. “Why? What’re you hoping to get out of it?” There was a bite to his tone which Lance couldn’t place.

Lance huffed a deprecating laugh, “Nothing, really. I just like to flirt. Sometimes I’ll make out with them.” Normally, he would have blushed a little at the admission, but he was so tired and the alcohol in his system made everything so fuzzy that he couldn’t even bring himself to feel embarrassed. It was partially true. Rarely did Lance ever get as far as to actually make out with anyone, and even then, he never let it escalate past that, he just couldn’t.

“But that’s it? You make out with some girl and then never speak to her again?” Keith pressed, turning his fiery eyes on Lance then. He took another puff from his cigarette.

Lance, not being completely sober, blurted out, “Well, guys too. I swing both ways.”

A guarded look of disgust crossed Keith’s face then, but it was quickly covered as he faced the window again. Lance watched him carefully, trying his best not to feel hurt from the expression, although it was difficult. “So just… anyone?” Keith dryly clarified.

“I–” Lance didn’t even have a chance to begin his sentence before Keith was speaking again, still purposely faced away from him.

“Well, Lance,” he declared, “it’s been fun, but I have to clean up the shop before I can open tomorrow, so I really should be leaving. Thanks for the food.” As he spoke, he put out his half-smoked cigarette and left the rest of it in the Corona can before stuffing his lighter and his cigarette pack deep into the recesses of his jean pockets. He grabbed his bookstore bag with the newest edition of UFO Activity; Aliens Revealed, along with his own can of Pabst off the table and headed to the door. “See you around,” he said, more as a common curtesy rather than someone who actually wanted to see Lance again. Then he stepped out of Lance’s room, grabbed his jacket form the front hook, and disappeared out the door.

Lance sat up in his bed, staring blankly at the door to his room in confusion. He had watched it all happen, a little dumbfounded. He hadn’t expected Keith to react that way when he opened up. Of course, he didn’t exactly know Keith all that well, having only met him the night before, but something about Keith felt safe and protective. They had been laughing and having fun. Keith had helped him prepare dinner and had listened intently when Lance rambled about random things. The Roswell debate they had had; that wasn’t nothing, it couldn’t have been. So, why did he get so angry all of a sudden?

He flopped back down onto the bed again, eyes on the ceiling. The muffled sounds of the television did nothing to mute the worried thoughts that filtered through his brain. He groaned, running his hands down his face before taking a deep breath. Slowly, he rolled over, burying his face into his pillow. Even though his bedding was newly washed, they weren’t enough to distract from the subtle hints of smoke in the air.


	4. Why Did You Leaf?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I love me some chapter-relevant puns. It's what I'm all about.

Why was Keith so angry?

Lance pulled away from the girl in front of him, their lips creating a wet pop as they disconnected. It was a gross noise, but Lance quickly forgot about it as the sound of their mingled panting replaced it. He stared at the girl for a moment. Well, more like he stared through her. His mind was elsewhere as they both regained their breath.

“What’s wrong?” the girl asked, a look of concern in her eyes.

Lance quickly glanced away, studying the dark wooden floor of the storage room they were hidden away in. It was a little bit impromptu of this girl to lure Lance into the back of the restaurant he worked at after his shift had finished just so they could make out next to the frozen food, but whatever, Lance had agreed. She was hot and she was interested in Lance, so who was he to pass up the opportunity.

Except, he was really beginning to wish he had passed it up.

“Nothing, I’m just…” he trailed off. “I’m not feeling this.” He stepped back as much as he could without bumping into another shelf behind him. Before he could even think about the gesture, his hand came up to wipe at the leftover saliva still glistening on his mouth.

The girl stared at him for a moment before adjusting her clothes and fixing her hair as best she could. “There’s someone else, isn’t there?” she asked.

Lance instantly turned to her, eyes-wide. “What? No!”

She didn’t look convinced, just tilting her head to give him an unimpressed stare. “Ah, there is. I was right,” she concluded.

“No, there isn’t!” Lance could feel his cheeks heating up. “Okay, well, there is someone, but it’s not like that! I just… upset somebody and I don’t know why…”

The girl hummed, indicating she was listening to Lance’s plight. “You should talk to her. Of course she would be mad if you’re neglecting her and going around using random girls as stand-ins,” she shot, a hint of anger in her tone.

Lance frowned, “I told you, we’re not like that. Besides, I’m not neglecting anyone, there’s no one to neglect, so you’re not a stand-in.”

“Then, in that case, why don’t you give me your number and we can meet up again?” she propositioned, a seductive smile on her face as she did. Her hip jutted out and she batted her eyelashes, hoping to entice Lance. A waterfall of blonde hair cascaded down her back, accentuating her face perfectly. She was beautiful, she was stunning, she was just Lance’s type. But he couldn’t.

“Sorry,” he muttered, backing up again. “One-time thing; that’s what we agreed,” he reminded. Then, without another word, Lance scampered out of the back room, the entire situation leaving a bad taste in his mouth.

It was strange, all Lance’s brain could focus on was the face of disgust Keith made, the clipped tones of irritation as he questioned Lance about the girl he had been flirting with outside the bookstore, the hasty exit. What had he done to make Keith upset? It had happened only three days before and still, Lance couldn’t figure out why it had all happened the way it did. Was it because Keith was homophobic? Did Keith just hate that Lance was willing to flirt with anyone? Did he think Lance desperate? These thoughts swirled around inside his head, even doing so much as ruining his enjoyment of making out with a hot girl. He couldn’t even remember her name, now that he thought about it.

This was a mess and Lance had to talk to Keith.

The Blue Spring Diner wasn’t too far away from Lance’s own apartment, it was part of the reason he had gotten a job there in the first place, so by extension, it was also very close to Keith’s workplace.

He stepped out into the frosty cold, shivering slightly as the first blast of cool air hit him on his way out the door. Snuggling farther into his winter coat, Lance headed out. It wasn’t nearly as cold out as it had been in the past couple days, but Lance still kicked himself for not remembering to bring his scarf that morning. He wasn’t even halfway down the street before the girl in the restaurant was already forgotten about.

Overhead, the sky was clear and bright, the perfect weather for being outside. Maybe it was a sign that everything was going to be okay? Lance liked to think so. He quickened his pace, hoping that by the time he got there, Keith would still be running his plant shop and that it wouldn’t be too overly busy. It was winter after all, so he couldn’t imagine it being all that packed, aside from the people buying houseplant supplies. Keith might not even want to talk to him though. Then what? No, best not to think that way. If Keith didn’t want to talk, then Lance would just make him listen instead.

With that in mind, Lance jogged across the street, careful not to get hit by any passing cars, then he rounded the corner and continued his trek to Keith’s. At some point, the thought occurred to Lance that he was being a little bit ridiculous to get so worked up over a guy who he had just met, especially since Keith was probably only letting Lance repay him without any further contact after that, but Lance just couldn’t bring himself to believe that that was where it ended, not after the way they had clicked. He wanted to be Keith’s friend, he wanted to have more debates about things and to hear more about Keith’s life. Lance wasn’t giving that up without a fight.

As Lance rounded another corner, the giant purple sign for Marmora Garden Shop came into view. It was chipped in some places, the paint appearing as though it were very old. Lance briefly wondered how long it had been around and for how long Keith had owned it. Those were the kinds of things Lance wanted to hear about from Keith, to have Keith tell him about.

With a confident and hopeful grin on his face, Lance took a deep breath and pulled open the door to the place. A bell jangled above him as he entered, permeating the silence with its melodic tone. Outside, the wind had been blowing softly, the birds had been chirping, the snow had crunched under his feet, but in this tiny plant store, everything was quiet and calm. It was as though Lance had crossed the threshold into another dimension. The lights in the ceiling were partially blocked by the sheer number of planters hanging about the store, blocking the light and creating an eerie, yet natural, feel to the room. It smelled heavily of water, dirt, and fresh plants. Vibrant colours lined the walls and shelves where the flowers bloomed, an abstract pattern of vivacious life wherever he looked.

And finally, in the centre of the store, Lance’s eyes fell upon a man casually resting against his elbows at the square shaped desk enclosure. His eyes were trained down on a book of some kind, his bangs dangling down to cover his face. He wore a dark, maroon-coloured hoodie, the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, dirt smudges along his arms and black, fingerless gloves adorning his hands. The way his shoulders relaxed told of a long night staying up to clean the shop for the day ahead.

When the bell rang, his eyes flicked upwards, staring through his bangs to see who it was. Once the recognition set in, Keith straightened, greeting Lance with a look that he wasn’t able to decipher.

“Slow day?” Lance asked, glancing around the empty store as he cautiously stepped closer to the counter, his hands jamming themselves as far into his pockets as they could go.

Keith left a pause in between Lance’s question and his next words, “It’s been not bad. It’s just slowing down now.” His tone gave nothing away.

“Oh, that’s good, that’s good. Yeah, the diner was packed today, so I understand that,” Lance laughed awkwardly, hoping Keith couldn’t tell how nervous he was to be talking to him as if last night hadn’t been weird at all. It didn’t help that Keith looked really good with his purple hoodie and his shaggy hair. When Keith just nodded in response, Lance pushed onward, “So, what’re you reading?”

Keith glanced to the book. A small smile appeared on his face and he flipped the book closed, spinning it around and shoving it at Lance without saying a word. UFO Activity; Aliens Revealed. It was the same copy the pair had been arguing over just the other night. “I’m reading up so I can really crush your non-believing ass,” Keith snickered.

Lance couldn’t help but smile at that, staring up to meet Keith’s eye. Although they were both smiling, there was still an air of apprehension between them, the hint of something unresolved, the undiscussed topic molding and festering the longer it went unmentioned.

“Keith…” Lance began hesitantly. He tried his best to smile, but it was probably too nervous to really seem natural. Keith’s smile was gone entirely and he met Lance’s stare with those intense eyes. “I just… About the other night, I do flirt with anyone…” he continued, searching Keith’s face for any kind of reaction, but there was none, “but why does that make you upset?”

Keith sighed, closing his eyes briefly. “I’m not upset,” he replied, sounding upset.

“Is it because I like boys too?” Lance pressed.

“No, it’s not that,” Keith admitted, turning to face the other wall, physically trying to escape the conversation as he did.

Lance stepped closer to the counter, catching Keith’s eye again as he did. “Is it because you think I’m too easy?” he grimaced.

“No, Lance, I–”

“Then why did you leave so suddenly the other night?” Lance interrupted, his voice raising a little bit. “Did I say or do something?”

Keith, determined not to meet Lance’s eyes began backing away, staring pointedly at a potted plant on the corner of the desk. A dark look crossed his face, pure of hatred and loathing. “You remind me of my father…” Keith hissed, voice dripping with venom.

Lance reared back a bit, not expecting any of that. The words, the tone, the expression; all of it was so unexpected and not what Lance had come to associate with Keith after their night of alien debates and homecooked meals. Lance had seen Keith get fired up and mad, but the way Keith spoke just then was something entirely different. “What? Your father…?” Lance repeated, taken aback.

“I despise my father… He messed up everything…” Keith practically growled, this time choosing to fully face away from Lance and busy himself with another plant on the other side of the desk. His shoulders were tense and his hands gripped the plant to hard.

Lance let the words hang in the air for a moment, taking them in and watching Keith hunched form fuss over the potted plant. He didn’t know anything about Keith’s family or his life, he didn’t presume to know. Whatever thing Keith’s father did to elicit such strong emotions from his son was none of Lance’s business. Something about Lance’s flirtatious habits was a reminder for Keith, and while Lance couldn’t understand and wasn’t going to push the subject, he also didn’t want it to get in the way of his own relationship with Keith.

“Keith…” Lance spoke, his voice dripping with gentle comfort. The man across the counter flinched at the use of his name. “I’m not your father… We’re not the same. I don’t know what he did, but I don’t want to hurt you, Keith,” Lance clarified.

As he exhaled a breath, Keith’s shoulders visibly relaxed. “I know… I know, I’m sorry.” He turned, facing Lance fully. His eyes still trailed to the other end of the store, and he still pressed his back up against the other end of the counter with his hands clutched to the edges of it, but he wasn’t hiding from Lance anymore. “I shouldn’t have… been like that…” he frowned.

“It’s fine.” Lance watched Keith’s eyebrows dip as he searched for the right words, a smile quirking at his lips. “Keith?” Lance said. At that, Keith’s eyes really did meet Lance’s fully, the same fire that had been there earlier, slightly dimmer and gentler now that they had resolved the issue to some extent. “You can’t crush me if you have no evidence,” Lance shrugged, a sly grin forming along his face.

Keith’s face lit up suddenly and he pushed himself off the counter, immediately stomping over to Lance. He threw the book open to a page somewhere near the back and slammed a finger onto one of the information blurbs. “You’re so smug but read this!” He whipped his head up to meet Lance’s eye again. “Can’t refute that!”

Lance couldn’t help but laugh, leaning forward to better inspect whatever Keith was trying to show him so he could stomp Keith’s point into the ground. This was good. This was what Lance wanted.

They stayed there at the counter, talking about every bit of alien evidence they could think of, not just the Roswell case, even offering their own theories on what aliens might be like, as well as the universe itself. The conversation was halted every time a customer came in from the cold to pick up some indoor plant supplies, but it didn’t end. And if Lance couldn’t help the way he watched Keith gracefully rush around the store to assist people, well then, good thing no one was there to call him out on it.

 

◊ ◊ ◊

 

Morning came all too fast for Lance. It wasn’t that he hated his job, but having such an early shift really made it difficult to enjoy it too. Still, just as with every morning, Lance got up, got ready, and bundled himself up in his favourite blue coat and scarf with matching gloves. The cold was relentless in the night prior, leaving behind much more snow than usual. Lance groaned as he leaped through the snow banks that had accumulated by his door. Snow fell into his boots with every step and he squealed at each one.

“Why can’t you mind your own business?” Lance grumbled at the snow as he tumbled out onto the clear sidewalk. He was going to have to shovel the path out eventually. The thought didn’t appeal to him.

Without wasting another second, Lance raced along down the sidewalks as fast as he could, yet still careful of any ice patches that might have been lurking beneath the snow. As he did, he couldn’t help the way his mind trailed back to Keith. It seemed to be doing that a lot since he had met Keith. Sometimes it was just mundane things like his smile or his eyes. Sometimes it was just a particular thing he said. But on this morning, on repeat, his mind replayed the moment when Keith’s face had morphed with hatred, fear, hurt, and rage as he brought up his father.

Lance couldn’t imagine what that man could have even done to make Keith so angry. He didn’t want to imagine either though. Lance’s own father wasn’t like that, he could never do something to make Lance hate him so passionately. Neither could his mother. Lance’s family was one of love and trust, never leaving anything to bubble under the surface, always making sure that everything was resolved. His entire family was like that too. His older sister, his younger sister, his baby sister and baby brother, none of them would ever purposely hurt anyone else in the family.

When Lance had come out to his family, they had all loved and accepted him without question. That was the way they were; understanding beyond all measure. He could remember the way his family had nervously sat down when he had asked them to. The way his hands shook and he couldn’t meet anyone’s eyes. How nervous he had felt during it all. Lance smiled as he recalled the awkward laugh he had emitted after blurting out some half-assed confession. _‘So, girls, huh? They’re pretty great. Y’know what else are great? Boys. Boys are great. Both of ‘em. Great.’_ Something ridiculous along those lines. To this day, they still joked around with his admission, using it as an inside family joke.

He thought about how after that, his older sister would not only point out cute girls to him, but also cute boys. His younger sister stopped making fun of him for not having a girlfriend, and started making fun of him for not having a girlfriend or a boyfriend. His parents still tried to set him up with their coworkers’ children, except now they included boys too. All in all, nothing really changed in his household, but also, nothing was ever really the same either, but in a good way.

Another thing that stuck with Lance, always there at the back of his mind, was his first love. Nyma, the most beautiful girl that Lance had ever seen. She was tall, graceful, elegant, intelligent, and she had the most naturally stunning face. Her looks were bar none, she could have been a model if she chose to, and everything about her was vexing. That should have been Lance’s first clue something wasn’t right when they started dating, because Lance was nothing compared to her, just another everyday, mundane slack-jaw off the street.

How many dates had they been on where Lance had gotten her flowers, had taken her to the best places he could, had so genuinely wanted to get to know her? How many kisses had they shared, nights had they spent together, stories had they told? How many times had Lance wanted to introduce her to his family, thinking that he had finally found the one, believing that for a year? Lance had loved Nyma.

But, apparently, Nyma didn’t love Lance back. She never had, in fact. Lance had to find out the hard way that not only was Nyma cheating on him, but he was the one on the side, he was the other man. Rolo, that was his name. Nyma loved Rolo. Not enough to respect him and not cheat on him, but she loved him more than she had ever and would ever love Lance, that was for sure. The unapologetic smirk she gave as she shrugged and muttered, “Guess I’m busted,” before leaving his life forever, that was what really broke Lance.

After that, things had slotted into place for Lance. He had always wondered why her schedule to see him was so strange and sporadic, but he had never once thought it was because she was working around Rolo’s schedule so that he wouldn’t catch her. Lance had been so blind to it all, so in love with Nyma that the thoughts wouldn’t even dare cross his mind until it was already too late. It had all been a game to her, a fun little side project and nothing more. Lance hadn’t meant anything to her, but she meant everything to Lance.

He had cried over her. If his family hadn’t have been there for him, Lance could have easily fallen into a depression. He was close to it, but luckily, he had pulled through and moved on. Part of it was because of his family, but in secret, another part of it was because he opened himself, willingly making out with any guy or girl that wanted to, stripping himself of Nyma’s imprint. A distraction, that’s all they were. Slowly but surely though, Lance had moved on, forgetting about Nyma while remembering the pain he had felt. Likewise, slowly but surely, the random people Lance flirted with and made out with all stopped being a distraction, and started being a defense mechanism. Long gone were the days of relationships that required trust and risk, Lance was more than happy just to offer his body, but never his heart. Never again would he let himself fall for someone like he had for her. Never again would Lance fall in love.

But that didn’t matter anymore. Lance was happy.

Pushing those depressing thoughts from his mind, Lance focused on the snow-covered sign for The Blue Spring Diner with its swooping letters in such an old, outdated blue that Lance wasn’t even sure they sold that colour of paint anymore. He grinned, readying himself for another day of flirting with all his patrons as he danced around the restaurant to serve cups of coffee and plates of waffles. As he hopped up onto the sidewalk and pulled the door open, he was immediately hit with the warming scent of breakfast. Hunk was in already, it seemed.

For pretty much Lance’s entire life, he had been friends with Hunk. Like a lighthouse in the stormy sea, like an oasis in a desert, like a familiar face in a crowd, Hunk was a blessing. He was the anchor of Lance’s life, keeping him from straying too far into trouble and doing things he’d regret. Hunk, didn’t have an impulsive bone in his body, which was good, because Lance wasn’t the best at thinking things through most of the time. They really complemented each other in that regard.

When Hunk had gotten the job at The Blue Spring Diner as the chef, Lance really wasn’t surprised at all. If there was one thing that Hunk could do like no other, it was cook. Their boss, Sal, had been impressed with Hunk’s abilities. Of course, he would never admit he was impressed, but he was impressed, Lance could tell. And who wouldn’t be? Hunk’s food was to die for. Lance, being the charismatic flirt that he was, got the job of a waiter pretty easily. It took a bit of work to remember which food went to what table, but Lance picked it up really quickly. So, just as best friend combos hoped, they worked together. It was ideal.

Lance hurried to the back, trading his winter gear for his blue apron. As he tied the apron up behind him, he stepped into the kitchen. “Lance reporting for duty!” he called.

From his place in the kitchen, the taller man turned around. He teased, “Hey, man! I was beginning to think you were swallowed by a snowbank or something.”

“I know you’re joking, but it was close! If snow wasn’t a Christmas staple, I’d be a lot more upset about this, because it’s ridiculous,” Lance grinned.

“You’re telling me,” Hunk sighed. “Traffic this morning was crazy. There was an accident on Arus street and it took forever to get through.”

Lance slapped a hand on his friend’s back, smiling up at him encouragingly. “Traffic or no traffic, the good patrons of this diner need us now more than ever, and who are we to deny them their food?” Lance announced, overdramatic as always.

Hunk laughed in response, “You’re absolutely right. Now get out there and start taking order while I man the grill.” And with a swat of his towel at Lance, the server scampered out of the kitchen with a smile on his face, ready for another day of work.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I want to start another fic but every time I go through the 2373509820275 other fic ideas I have, only to end up saying "Nah, I need to come up with something different!" Then I spend four hours designing and fleshing out another idea which will also be abandoned within the day.


	5. Close, but No Cigar

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh man my dear friends, I am so terribly sorry for neglecting to post this morning, I woke up late and barely had enough time to get to the bus, let alone post this! But it's here now! Sorry, sorry!

For as long as Lance had been renting his apartment, he so rarely noticed the lights on in the little building across the street. Keith’s building.

Lance had just finished up his shift at the diner and decided to head straight home. Well, maybe not straight home, he did stop at the gas station on the corner to pick up some food. Still, by the time he got back, it was pretty late. Not late to him, but late enough that he knew most people on the block would be asleep. One of those people being Keith, who always closed his shop at the same time and turned all the lights off shortly after. Except for this time, seeing as the lights were on. Lance had known Keith for around a week and a half by this point and hadn’t once seen Keith’s lights on this late.

It was a little weird, but Lance didn’t think about it as he crossed the street from where he had been heading to his own apartment to instead go check on Keith. As he neared the front entrance of the store, he could hear muffled voices coming from the other side of the door. It was tempting to listen and see what he could hear, but Lance wasn’t that much of a creep. Instead, he rapped his knuckles on the door a few times and stepped back, waiting.

There was a pause in the noise beyond the door, then another muffled sentence was said and footsteps patted their way over to the door. It swung open, nearly hitting Lance in its path. Keith stood there, a little peeved in the way he glared at Lance. “Can I help you?” he muttered.

“Hey! I just noticed your lights were still on and I thought I’d come by,” Lance gave a crooked smile, hoping Keith didn’t find this all as creepy as Lance was starting to realize it was. He held up the plastic gas station bag, “I brought food.”

Keith’s eyes flickered between Lance and the bag before his face softened and he stepped away from the door to leave Lance standing in the open doorway. “Come on in. I’m just in the middle of a call, so you’re going to have to wait,” Keith instructed. “Sit wherever.”

“Thanks,” Lance grinned. He stepped over the threshold and stomped his boots out onto the doormat. As he entered the store properly, his eyes instinctively moved to take Keith in as he glanced back at Lance from the counter. Lance almost did a double take. He hadn’t even noticed it when he had come in, more focused on the food and Keith’s phone call, but Keith was wearing a giant, oversized blue sweatshirt with a black stripe across the chest and extending over the arms. It covered down to his thighs and he had to hike up the sleeves when he needed to use his hands for anything. He also wore a black beanie which still allowed his hair to poke out in the back.

He looked adorable and cozy in his warm clothes, a tired lilt to his natural scowling face. It was probably because it was so cold outside, no doubt, but Lance couldn’t help it when his face warmed suddenly.

Luckily, without even noticing Lance’s internal predicament, Keith picked up a phone from the counter in the centre of the room and wandered to the storage room near the back. “Hey, yeah, sorry about that. My neighbour just came by,” Keith’s distant voice informed into the receiver. There was a pause. “No! It isn’t like that! Why do you always have to do this every time I meet anyone?” he cried, irritation in his tone.

Lance made his way to the centre of the room, smoothing out a place on the counter before hoisting himself up and onto it. His legs kicked, careful not to scuff the wood of the desk with his muddy boots. Keith wouldn’t appreciate that. A box of cigarettes and an old, worn looking novel were on one end of the counter while the bag sat beside him on his other side. He stared down at the pack of cigarettes, wondering if he had ever seen that brand before. Then he inspected the book, not sure he had ever heard of either. It looked interesting enough, maybe he’d ask Keith about it.

As he waited on Keith, he absently wondered who he was calling. Lance’s hands slithered over to the bag to remove a bag of chips and pop it open. As he waited, he munched on the food, distracted.

“Where did you hear that?” Keith said to whoever was on the other end of the line. “Yeah, yeah, I’ll be there. Don’t worry, I won’t forget again.” Keith groaned long and drawn-out before replying. _“I will!_ Okay, I _get it_ … Uh huh…”

It hadn’t hit him as hard when he had first entered Marmora Garden Shop, but it was really hot in there. Probably as a result of the tiny space heater that Keith was keeping underneath the desk. Even with the room boiling, Keith was still holed up in there with his enormous sweater. Keith was probably cold blooded. He probably had cold hands. Lance had naturally warm hands, just shy of being clammy. The thought occurred to him then that that would be perfect if they ever held hands. He smiled as he shoved more chips into his mouth.

 

◊ ◊ ◊

 

“Right, love you too, bye,” Keith replied into the phone. Then he pulled it back from his ear and hit the end call button. Talking on the phone was exhausting, but talking to his ever-persistent brother on the phone and trying to plan things was even more so. Don’t get him wrong, he loved his brother, but Shiro had a way of making everything so much more difficult that it had to be. Keith had already promised he would be coming home for Christmas, that should have been the end of it. He heaved a sigh.

Keith poked his head out of the storage room to watch as Lance kicked his legs like a little kid while seated on the front desk. His eyes were to the ceiling as he inspected all the plants hanging up. A bag of chips was in his hands and he seemed quite content to dump the entirety of it into his mouth without a second thought. A small hint of a smile formed along Keith’s face and he instantly felt eased with the distraction.

Stepping out of the storage room, Keith made his way over to Lance, his footsteps echoing in the quiet calm of the store. Lance instinctively turned to meet Keith’s eye, grinning when he did.

“Hey! How was your phone call?” he asked through his mouthful of chips.

Keith, while finding that mildly disgusting, chose to ignore it. “Stressful. My brother is always worried about everything I do. He can’t just let things be,” he sighed.

Lance laughed, “My siblings are like that sometimes, but mostly they just want to make fun of me.”

Keith hummed, raising his eyebrows in exasperation, “Yeah, I got a sibling like that too.” He made his way over to the bag by Lance rather than awkwardly standing next to him against the counter. “What’d you bring?” He pulled out a package of Twizzlers and grimaced. “What is this?” he demanded.

“The staple candy of movie night? What does it look like?” Lance countered, staring at Keith as though he were an idiot.

“You said you brought food,” Keith frowned.

Lance thwapped the bag with the back of his hand. “I did. Snacks of all kinds! Take your pick!”

“This isn’t food,” Keith mumbled, glaring into the bag once more. “Funyuns and Hickory Sticks are not food.”

Lance gasped, sounding genuinely offended, “I come in here to share my wares with you and this is the thanks I get in return?”

Keith settled the bag back down. “I thought you meant those shitty pep ‘n’ cheese sticks or something,” he whined, tired and not in the mood to deal with this.

“Right, the _real_ gas station food,” Lance clarified, obvious sarcasm in his tone.

Turning back to glare at him, Keith’s eye caught on his pack of cigarettes. There was only one more left, he knew, which was why it wasn’t over by the window where he usually kept it. “I’m going to the store. I have to buy more cigarettes anyways,” he told Lance as he headed for the door. He grabbed his jacket off the hook and slipped it over his shoulders.

Meanwhile, Lance had already hopped off the desk and made his way over to stand next to him. He left the rest of his food on the counter. “I’m coming too!” Lance announced as he bounced on the balls of his feet.

“Are you sure?” Keith asked. “You can just stay here if you’d prefer.”

“No, it’s fine. Besides, someone has to make sure you don’t get kidnapped by a snowbank,” he joshed, bumping his shoulder with Keith’s.

Keith snorted, amused. Then he grabbed his scarf off the hook and wrapped himself up. It was pretty cold in his shop already, even with the space heater, so Keith was already dressed fairly appropriately for the weather outside.

They both shivered as the cool winter air hit them. Keith let out a puff of air, watching as it formed a cloud, then dissipated. He stood on the porch for a moment, adjusting his scarf around his face. Lance skipped past him, waving his hands in the air to touch the falling snow. Keith smiled as he watched the other man tilt his head back and catch snowflakes on his tongue. He slapped Lance on the back, startling him out of his snowy distraction.

“C’mon, the snow’s not going to go anywhere,” Keith chuckled, sauntering down the sidewalk in the direction of the corner store.

Lance quickly jogged up beside him, falling into step easily. Lance’s legs were longer than his, which made it easy to keep up with Keith’s ridiculously long and quick strides. Keith was the type who only had one walking pace, and it was power-walk.

“If you tell me that this gas station food you’re going out to buy is your actual dinner, we’re going to have a problem,” Lance warned.

“And if it is, what’re you going to do?” Keith challenged.

Lance released a noise that was eerily similar to that of a dying animal. “It is, isn’t it? At least get a wrap, I can’t, in good conscious, know that you ate a gas station meat and cheese stick for dinner.”

Keith grunted, “I don’t like their wraps. Besides, at least a pep ‘n’ cheese is something. Better than eating nothing at all.”

“Keith, those things are so gross, you’d be better off not eating anything at all,” Lance stated matter-of-factly.

“You downed an entire bag of ketchup chips before we left,” Keith pointed out.

Lance shook his head, “Yeah, but I actually ate a dinner before I got here, so that doesn’t count.”

With an exasperated groan, Keith reached into his pocket and pulled out the last of his cigarettes along with a lighter. He quickly lit it, the glow of his lighter illuminating his face under the darkening sky. Swiftly taking a drag, he pulled the cigarette away from his mouth and blew the smoke into the air beside himself. “Sorry, I can’t hear you over this cig,” he drawled, lolling his head to smirk at Lance, who was sending a pointed glare his way.

“You’re smoking on your way to buy more smokes?” Lance raised an eyebrow.

Keith shrugged, “It’s just one. No one is around anyways.”

“I’m here,” Lance replied, staring back at the sidewalk.

Keith paused his hand where he was getting ready to bring the cigarette back up to his mouth. He stared over at Lance, attempting to decipher his expression, but failing. “Does it bother you? I can put it out if you want,” Keith offered, pausing where he was to stare Lance in the eye.

Lance stopped with him, glancing down at his cigarette before smiling again. His cheeks, nose, and ears were red from the cold and he shivered a little bit as they stood there in the snow, his shoulders hiked up and his hands jammed into his coat. A chill breeze fluttered his hair while he snuggled farther into his scarf.

“No, I don’t mind,” Lance answered softly. “It’s just…” he trailed off.

“Just, what?” Keith urged, tilting his head.

Lance stared at the cigarette in Keith’s raised hand again, furrowing his eyebrows as he did. “Isn’t that brand really old?”

Keith huffed a laugh as he brought the cigarette up the rest of the way to take a drag. His boots scuffed the snowy sidewalk as he turned to continue on the way to the store. He puffed the smoke out into the air ahead of him. Lance followed after him. “Yeah, it is pretty old. My father used to smoke it when I was younger, and so did my brother,” Keith recalled, sucking on the cigarette again.

“Your father?” Lance repeated, an air of confusion in his tone. “Even though you hate him?”

Keith paused again, smoke in his mouth. He spun around quickly, causing Lance to nearly bump into him. The smoke shot out of his nose as he breathed out forcefully. Lance’s eyes widened at the trick. “Yup,” Keith confirmed. He walked a little faster down the path this time, the cold biting at his face and nipping at his ears. The store wasn’t that far.

After a moment, Keith noticed that his footsteps were the only sound on the street. He paused once more, turning back to Lance, who continued to stand there, staring after him with an odd look on his face. Keith frowned and clicked his tongue, “Stop it.”

“Stop what?” Lance squinted one eye, tilting his head.

“I know that face. Stop psychoanalysing me,” he groaned.

Lance looked surprised for a moment before narrowing his eyebrows and glancing away. “What? I wasn’t…”

Keith heaved a sigh, walking over to meet Lance where he had stopped under the dull streetlamp. “You’re lying, I can see it. What? Are you going to go full Freud on me?” he snapped.

“Keith, I’m not– I didn’t– You can smoke your cigarettes, I’m not saying you can’t…” Lance stuttered out, looking pissed while sounding like he was trying to defuse Keith’s temper.

“Are you going to tell me I have daddy issues?” Keith spat.

Lance’s eyes flashed with hurt. “Keith, I didn’t say that…”

They both stood there, staring at each other under the weak light. Keith’s eyes were fierce and intimidating as he searched Lance’s face for a sign of anything; pity, disgust, amusement. Something that would indicate that Lance was lying, making fun of Keith, surveying him like a zoo animal just as so many others had done, just as he had done to his own father. There was nothing though, just Lance’s understanding and worried demeanor laced with the genuine desire to be friends.

Keith’s anger receded as he breathed deeply, taking a non-threatening step towards Lance. He looked away, purposely avoiding Lance’s gaze. He dropped his cigarette to the ground, pressing his boot into it and twisting, just to be sure. Biting the skin off his lip in a guilty action, he reached up, and, in a gesture that was unexpected even to himself, he adjusted Lance’s scarf, covering his face better. “Let’s go,” he mumbled, nodding along with his own words but still refusing to make eye contact. “It’s cold out here.”

Then he gingerly stepped away and let his legs lead him through the snow on autopilot as he tried his best not to think about everything that had just taken place. After a moment, Lance joined him, jogging a little bit to catch up, but not much since he still had those stilts for legs.

Luckily, the store was right there, meaning Keith didn’t have to stew in his own guilty defensiveness for too long. The silence between him and Lance was eating at him anyway. As soon as they got to the door, Keith noticed Lance wander off to the side and lean up against the building.

“You’re not coming in?” he questioned, his hand still poised to grab the door.

“No, I’m fine staying outside,” Lance answered, glancing at Keith out of the corner of his eye.

Keith nodded, “Alright.” He opened the door, the warmth hitting him instantly. It was enticing and tempting, pulling at him and grabbing him. But he didn’t step inside, something stopped him. Keith stared down at his feet for a second before his impulse gave in and he turned to Lance. In a more subdued voice, he said, “Uh… I’m sorry… for, y’know, barking at you back there. You’re… not a bad guy.” He gave a sincere smile at the end, hoping Lance understood the message.

And immediately, Keith was sure he did something wrong, because Lance’s previous casual position against the store tensed up. Lance’s face was a mix of panic and awe, eyes wide and intense with their watery blue hue. Keith felt himself flushing with slight embarrassment. Without waiting for a response, Keith rushed inside and away from the entire situation.

There was no way Keith was going to let himself ruin his friendship with Lance when it had just started.

 

◊ ◊ ◊

 

There was no way Lance was going to let himself ruin his friendship with Keith when it had just started.

That was why the second Keith disappeared into the store, he stared directly ahead, stuck in a panicked state as he desperately willed his rapidly beating heart to calm down. What was that? What the hell was that? One moment Lance had been walking along with Keith, trying to think up ways he could prove to Keith that he didn’t see the man as anything less than a friend, when suddenly, that sentiment changed.

Keith had just been about to head into the store to buy his cigarettes and ‘real’ food. Except, he hesitated, then he turned to Lance to tell him he was sorry and that Lance wasn’t that bad. That was it. In that moment, Lance saw it, he felt it. He was pretty sure that it had been there since the beginning, he just hadn’t noticed, but he noticed now.

He noticed in the way that Keith’s hair spilled out of his beanie, windblown and gentle. He noticed in the way Keith’s cheeks and nose tinged a brilliant red from the cold. He noticed in the way Keith’s soft smile and apologetic eyes fought the urge to look away from Lance. He noticed in the way Keith’s words were dripping with emotion as he stuttered through them, clearly unrehearsed. He noticed in the way Keith glowed under the convenience store light as he was slowly covered in a million melting snowflakes, the picture of perfection in that moment.

Lance was falling for Keith, he could feel it happening. Everything that Keith had done or said all flashed through Lance’s mind. It suddenly all made sense, a revelation that was a long time coming. How long had Lance even known Keith? A week and a half? This couldn’t be happening, it just couldn’t. Lance had flirted with countless people on a daily basis, he talked to the same patrons for years, he’d made out with dozens of people in that same time, and no one had made him feel anything remotely romantic. Not one single person had made his heart beat and his palms sweat just from a glance, not since Nyma.

No one, that is, until Keith.

Lance had been doing so well, he wasn’t falling for anybody, he wasn’t letting himself get sucked into that trap again. It had been working, his system of making out with people to dispel his pent-up emotions. But this was unexpected and unwarranted. Lance hadn’t prepared himself for this. He couldn’t fall for Keith, there was just no way he could let that happen. It would ruin his friendship with Keith, which was already tentative to begin with. Keith would probably just laugh at Lance’s feelings, or maybe he’d be disgusted that someone who reminded him of his father was romantically interested in him. Keith wouldn’t love him back, never would. It would be like Nyma all over again, and Lance couldn’t do it, not twice. That kind of pain was something he wouldn’t even wish upon his worst enemies. Keith was probably straight anyways, fuck.

As his internal panic began to really set in, the door to the gas station was pushed open, nearly bumping him in the shoulder since he wasn’t paying attention.

“I can’t believe you actually waited outside. You were shivering on the walk here. You’re probably going to get sick and die of pneumonia at thirty,” a familiarly gravelly voice chastised. Lance couldn’t bring himself to turn his head, fearing that if he ever met Keith’s eye again, he might never remove himself from the chasm of feelings he was currently tumbling into.

Suddenly, something was shoved into his chest, nearly knocking the wind out of Lance completely. “Here,” Keith grumbled. “A peace offering or whatever…”

Lance stared down at the bag in his hands. Sour Patch Kids, a personal favourite of Lance’s. Not that Keith knew that, but it still tripped the alarm in his heart, instantly causing him to overreact to and overthink such a simple, yet kind, offer. “Thank you,” he replied, a little dumbfounded.

“Yeah, don’t mention it. Let’s just get back, it’s freezing,” Keith complained, speed-walking through the parking lot to reach the sidewalk quicker.

Lance watched the bundled-up figure of the man hurry away. The man who believed so strongly in aliens, loved his plants, hated his father, smoked regularly, was kind even though he was a little rough around the edges, smiled rarely but brightly, and stole Lance’s heart the moment he had met him, like the world’s stealthiest thief. Lance hadn’t even noticed he was missing anything until right then.

He noticed now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys, I almost died today. My school was having a Tape Your Friend To A Wall competition and I got taped to the wall, but because of the way my one friend taped me, when they removed the chair from under my feet to see if I would stay up, I was basically hanged by the duct tape around my chest. No one even noticed I was choking for a moment, but they got me down. There's a little bruise on my neck now but I got a $5 gift card to Timmy Ho's so it was worth it.


	6. Can't Seem to Pool Myself Together

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, hey, hey! Look at that! I didn't forget to post this one on time, heh heh, nailed it.

“I can’t take it, I can’t fucking take it,” Keith aggressively hissed, slumping down into the chair at the corner table closest to the cash register. He slammed his elbows onto the surface, holding his head in his hands and staring straight ahead into the abyss.

“Uh… Can’t take what?” Pidge asked, throwing a confused, yet concerned, expression to Allura at the register.

Keith hadn’t even taken the time to ask Allura for his coffee, choosing instead to barrel into the café and drop his half-dead body into the seat next to Pidge. It was just too much, and it had been too much for weeks. Keith was at the end of his rope. “Lance,” Keith breathed, as though saying his name too loud might summon him. At this point, Keith wouldn’t have been surprised.

“Lance?” Allura repeated.

“Yes! I met this guy, Lance, less than a month ago and he’s nice, we’re friends. Suddenly though, he starts following me around everywhere! I swear, I can’t get away from him!” Keith cried, raking his hands through his hair desperately.

Pidge frowned, “I’m sorry, back up. Did you just say you actually made a friend? On your own?”

“Pidge! This is serious!” Keith glared.

“Looks pretty serious; you’re ripping your own hair out,” Pidge commented, watching as Keith mauled his mane some more.

Allura smiled sympathetically, “I don’t think he’s following you, Keith. He’s probably just trying to get to know you better and you’re just not used to it.” She propped her elbows up on the tiny divider between her position at the counter and the table.

Pidge, swallowing a sip of her coffee, agreed, “That’s gotta be it. Normal people hang out with new friends. I know that’s a novel concept for you, but this Lance character – if he even exists – most likely isn’t as socially stunted as you.”

“What do you mean, ‘if he even exists?’” Keith sat up straighter, pulling his hands down to tangle amongst the hair at his neck.

“I’m just saying, you don’t make friends on the regular or anything,” she explained, looking unconvinced of Keith’s meltdown.

Luckily, Allura interrupted before Pidge could say anything else, “Don’t listen to her, you’re not socially stunted. It’s just unexpected of you, that’s all. Lance is probably just being friendly.”

“I thought that too,” Keith began, “but something happened, he suddenly started getting _too_ friendly!” Keith argued.

“What?!” Allura exclaimed.

Pidge’s eyebrows narrowed, “Too friendly as in…?”

Keith stared between them for a moment, not understanding their anger. Then it hit him. “Oh, no, not like that!”

“If he’s done anything to you, Keith, I swear, I won’t hesitate to–”

Keith cut her off, “He hasn’t done anything, just let me finish.” Allura and Pidge were both silent there, Pidge still with a look of mistrust on her face, but willing to listen. Allura seemed worried too, but calmer than before. “We had hung out a few times since we first met, all normal by my account. Then suddenly, around two weeks ago, he started showing up no matter where I went! Every time I wake up to open the shop, he’s there to greet me. Every time I’m at the gas station, he comes running in to say hello. Every time I close up the shop, he comes by to say goodnight and talk about stuff. I even ran into him at the bookstore in an aisle that was completely dedicated to plant books. He doesn’t own any plants, I know, I’ve been to his apartment!” he threw his hands up in the air, riled up at the mere thought of these encounters.

“Okay,” Pidge nodded, her eyes widened, “you’re right, that does sound a little bit…”

“…abnormal…?” Allura filled in, still unsure of how to respond.

Pidge shrugged, “I was going to say ‘stalkerish,’ but that works too.”

Keith closed his eyes, letting his upper body sag onto the table again. “What do I do…?” he whined.

“You could talk to him about it…” Allura suggested, not entirely confident in her words.

“Right, because that’s Keith’s strong suit,” Pidge snorted.

Eyes snapping open so he could properly glare, he bit back, “Like you can talk, Pidge, all you do is sit on your computer all day and drink coffee.”

Pidge reared back slightly in faux offense, “Wow, I thought you wanted my help!”

“You weren’t helping!” Keith groaned.

Allura interrupted the argument, quickly taking control once again, “As I was saying, Keith, you should talk to him about it. Maybe he doesn’t even realize it’s making you uncomfortable.”

Keith glanced up at her from where his arms were still cradling his neck. She smiled down at him reassuringly. Keith felt himself relaxing just from seeing her smile. “Yeah… Yeah, you’re probably right,” he nodded along, smiling softly along with her. “He’s not stalking me.”

The door at the front jingled as it was pressed open and bubbly footsteps entered the store. “Keith!” an excited voice called.

Keith’s eyes widened. “He’s stalking me!” Keith hissed, only loud enough for Pidge and Allura to hear.

Lance instantly hurried over to Keith’s table, smiling first at Allura, then at Pidge, “Hi, I’m Lance!”

“Nice to meet you, Lance, I’m Allura,” the barista greeted politely.

“’Sup,” Pidge nodded. “I’m Pidge.”

Lance didn’t seem to take notice of Keith’s internal crisis because he continued to casually converse without acknowledging it. “So, are you Keith’s… friends…?” he asked, a slight pause in the middle, as though he wasn’t sure. His voice was tight as he said 'friends.'

“Yeah, I know it’s surprising, but he does have friends,” Pidge deadpanned.

Keith kicked her under the table.

Lance laughed, choosing then to turn to Keith. “Hey, Keithy boy!” Lance greeted, standing next to Keith’s chair with a smile. “My shift ended earlier today since Christmas is coming up, so I wanted to know if we could hang out later? There’s a nice bar on Kerberos street,” he explained.

Gathering his courage to tell Lance that he was being too forward and pushy, Keith took a deep breath and turned to him, “I don’t…” his words died down as soon as he made eye contact. Lance was smiling, a bright and excited grin. His eyes shined with anticipation, waiting for Keith to answer. He bounced on the balls of his feet gently, rocking a little bit in the motion, like he couldn’t contain all his enthusiasm within himself. It was almost cute how excited he looked.

Keith’s brain suddenly supplied him with an image of a sad, dejected Lance. A Lance that used fake smiles and weak jokes to disguise how hurt he really was. Keith couldn’t even bring himself to consider putting that look on Lance’s face or instilling those feelings in him. Lance was so kind and friendly, Keith couldn’t say no to him, and especially not to that face.

“I don’t see why not…” he finished, offering a shaky, yet genuine, smile back at Lance.

The other man instantly brightened, his entire face lighting up like Keith’s response was the best thing he had ever heard. “Awesome! They have a really nice pool table there; perfect for kicking your ass,” he laughed, nudging his elbow into Keith’s shoulder lightly.

“We’ll see about that,” Keith teasingly jeered.

Lance smirked at him, “Nuh uh, Keith, they don’t call me Sharpshooter for nothing!”

Keith laughed at that, his head tossing back. “Who calls you that?” he guffawed.

“Everyone! And you’ll be calling me that too once you see these amazing pool skills!” Lance announced, standing up proud and tall.

“Doubt it,” Keith scoffed, crossing his arms over his chest.

Lance harrumphed, “You’re going to eat those words. Get ready.” Then he stepped back away from the table, and effectively, away from Keith. “I’m just going to be over one building at the drugstore. Come find me when you’re ready to go?”

“Yeah, I won’t be too long,” Keith replied, twisting in his chair to watch Lance go.

“Great! See you! And, bye Allura, Pidge, it was nice meeting you both!” With one final smile, Lance turned and hurried out the door.

Keith watched him walk away through the glass window until he was out of sight, then he turned around in his seat and slouched back down. A heavy sigh left him.

“Okay, so you weren’t joking, he is really friendly,” Pidge commented.

“I thought he was very sweet!” Allura offered.

Pidge hummed, “Yeah, but I’ve seen glue get less attached to Keith.” She raised an eyebrow as she brought her drink up to her lips.

“I suppose,” Allura agreed. “I wonder why…”

“That’s what I’d like to know!” Keith huffed dramatically. “He’s a nice guy and I like being his friend, but I think something’s up.”

A mocking grin formed along Pidge’s face as she jutted her chin towards the door. “Well, why don’t you go find out what it is. He’s waiting for you!” she singsonged.

Keith gave her an unamused glare, abruptly standing from his chair nonetheless. “You just like to watch me suffer,” he grumbled.

“We like to see you make friends, Keith,” Allura corrected.

“And if you suffer in the process, who am I to pass up free entertainment?” Pidge snickered.

Allura smiled, not the calming one this time, but rather a mischievous one, “Exactly.”

“Whatever, I’ve got a pool game to win.” Keith bundled himself up within his coat and scarf, making his way to the door as he did.

“Goodbye, Keith,” Allura called.

“See you later, _Keithy boy!”_ Pidge cackled. 

Keith waved back at them, pushing the door outwards with his back as he stepped into the frigid cold. He did, after all, have some ass to kick. If Lance thought he was going to beat Keith at pool, then he was sorely mistaken, that was for damn sure.

 

◊ ◊ ◊

 

Lance licked his finger and stuck it into the air, testing the direction and force of the wind. There was no wind. He was indoors. Still, he carefully lined up the pool cue with the billiard ball, bending over to see exactly where he was aiming. His eyebrows narrowed in concentration and he kept his hands steady, rolling his shoulders deliberately. Taking a deep breath and flexing his fingers, he assessed the situation again. The shot was his, he could make it no problem. If he missed this, everything was over. He had to beat Keith. Not impress him, no, no. Beat him. That was the key.

He took the shot. It missed.

“Wow,” Keith hummed, sat against the bench off to the side with a Pabst in his hands.

Lance whipped around to glare at him, his face heating up with embarrassment. “Shut up, I was distracted.”

“Distracted by what?” Keith raised an eyebrow.

 _You,_ his brain supplied. He ignored it, choosing instead to say, “The state of our country.”

Keith squinted in confusion, opening his mouth to say something but closing it after a moment, unsure of how to respond to that. “I’m sure that’s what it was, Lance,” he settled on, lifting his beer to his mouth again.

“Oh! I see how it is! Why don’t you come over here and put your money where your mouth is?” Lance prodded, handing the pool cue out to Keith with a smarmy smirk.

Keith handed his beer to Lance and took the cue. Then he sauntered over to the pool table and readied his shot.

Now, Lance had been doing very well since the revelation that maybe his feelings for Keith weren’t as platonic as he had been convincing himself this whole time. Aside from the brief moment where he felt unnaturally jealous while meeting Keith’s friends, thinking one of them might have been Keith’s girlfriend. Other than that, it had all been going well since the gas station incident. In the moment he had realized, it was panicking and slightly suffocating, but over the following two weeks, he had a lot of time to really get comfortable with the notion of a crush on Keith. As long as he didn’t verbalize it, act on it, or let it get too out of hand, then eventually it would die out. All Lance had to do was wait it out.

Which, was a lot easier said than done, especially when Keith was making that intensely concentrated face he always made as he focused on the ball. Lance could feel butterflies erupting within his stomach. Could Keith maybe not do that thing where he poked his tongue out and smirked right before he took the shot, because it was very distracting and very bad for Lance’s entire ‘letting the crush pass’ plan? Then of course, Keith’s shot had to hit perfectly, exactly how it had been expected. And Lance was _impressed!_ This was all so terrible.

Keith turned to Lance and gave a casual shrug, obviously meant specifically to rile Lance up even more than the shot had.

“Well, clearly, one of us doesn’t care about the political and economic climate of this country and that’s why the shot went in,” Lance shrugged back.

Keith laughed, his head falling back as he meandered back over to Lance, retrieving his beer. “You suck at pool because this country is just in shambles,” Keith snorted. “That explains why you’ve lost the last three rounds of 8 Ball.”

“Yuck it up, but I can kick your ass at tons of other games! Like Snakes and Ladders,” Lance crossed his arms, staring up at Keith from where he was sat.

“That’s a luck based game,” Keith reminded, confused.

Lance nodded, “And I’ll still win. You’ll see next time.”

There was a pause in the conversation then, Keith’s expression dropping a bit. “Yeah… About that…” he awkwardly opened, shuffling his feet backwards until he hit the pool table. Lance felt his heart drop momentarily. “Don’t you think we’ve been spending a lot of time together?” he asked, more as though he were asking Lance if that was the correct question at all.

Heartbeats filled his ears as mind screamed at him, a symphony of yelling about how Keith had figured him out in only two weeks. Lance schooled his face, hoping that Keith was oblivious enough not to notice as Lance scoffed and huffed, making a show of how ridiculous he found Keith’s suggestion.

“Uh, yeah. That’s what friends do, Keith,” he chuckled.

Keith took a drink of his beer before turning back to Lance with an unimpressed look. “You followed me to the bookstore,” he pointed out flatly.

Lance sputtered, not prepared to be called out for briefly stalking Keith. His face reddened. “I did not!” he defended.

Keith sighed, “Not that I don’t like hanging out with you, Lance, I just worry that you’re not doing anything else. Don’t you have people to meaninglessly make out with, or whatever?” He waved a hand around flippantly, not even bothering to try hiding the grimace as he said the words.

Lance glanced around the bar swiftly, assessing all the other patrons at other pool tables as well as actual tables. Shuffling up to Keith, he leaned down until his mouth was right by Keith’s ear. He tried his best to make it casual and not let his nerves show, although it was difficult. Keith tensed a little bit, but quickly settled when he followed Lance’s subtly pointed finger with his gaze.

“You see those two guys there,” Lance asked in a hushed voice. Across the bar, one tall, well-dressed man with shaggy black hair and glasses was saying something to a shorter man with a black beanie, which covered most of his fiery red hair, and a baggy sweatshirt two sizes too big. They both looked to be laughing and having a good time, but Lance could feel it in his gut that it was more than that.

“What about them?” Keith grumbled back, his eyebrows furrowed.

Lance smiled sneakily, “They’re dating.”

“What? How can you tell?” Keith scrunched up his nose. Lance berated himself for finding it attractive.

“My gaydar is top notch. I can tell a mile away,” Lance proudly answered.

Keith hummed, low and thoughtful. Then he rapidly turned his face towards Lance, completely disregarding just how close in proximity they were to one another. There, under the minimal light of bar, with a pool cue in one hand and a beer in the other, Keith’s breath puffed against Lance’s lips, almost teasingly, as he asked, “Do we look like that?” His eyebrows were worried together and his tone suggested he didn’t want to appear that way with Lance.

Lance squashed down the hurt he could feel in his chest, the bubbling hint of rejection scratching at the back of his mind. He quickly moved away from Keith, grabbing the pool cue from the other man’s hand as he did. “No, we don’t,” he answered, keeping his voice as neutral as he could.

Keith followed along with his beer in hand. He watched Lance put away the pool cue back on the rack. “What’s the difference?” Keith questioned, glancing back to the pair who Lance had claimed were actually dating.

Before turning around, Lance took a deep breath, forcing the same charming persona he normally embodied to come to the surface. He spun around, smiling brightly at Keith. “This is the point I was trying to make, Keith. It’s different because you and I are friends! Friends hang out! That’s why we spend so much time together. I could be out there, somewhere, with someone, making out and flirting, but instead, I’m here with you. Even though it’s obvious I’m annoying you, and neither of us expect anything from the other, you still stay with me and spend time with me.”

Keith didn’t say anything, he just stood there. Violet eyes stared deeply into blue eyes, flicking back and forth as he searched for something. Lance laughed nervously. He hadn’t meant to get as deep as he had with his explanation, but it was all out there now. “Lance…” Keith breathed, still standing back some ways with his Pabst.

Lance didn’t give him time to finish, immediately looking anywhere else in the room as he continued, “Or maybe you’re just too cocky and think you’re going to win everything. If that’s the case, then I’ll prove you wrong.”

A beat passed where Keith continued to read Lance’s face, but then his body slumped and he sighed, dropping his gaze to the beer in his hands. When he looked back up, he smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes, Lance could see that clearly. Keith wasn’t the best at hiding his expression. “I’m sure you will,” he jested. “I hear you play a mean game of Snakes and Ladders.” He sounded tired, but still genuine. Like he meant every word a little too much. As if those words held more implication than what was said. Lance couldn’t read between the lines, not this time.

“Tomorrow?” Lance suggested hopefully.

“Tomorrow,” Keith confirmed. This time, his smile stretched into a real smile, an honest, Keith-like smile. Lance loved those the most.

 

◊ ◊ ◊

 

As they stepped out of the bar and into the frigid night air, Lance suggested walking home together since they lived across the street from each other anyways. Keith just agreed without question. His mind was elsewhere, so he wasn’t exactly focused on what Lance was doing or saying. Even as they passed people on the sidewalks, weaving and bobbing through the streets, Lance retold Keith his day, including the insignificant details of the specific patrons that came in. Lance had a way of making even the most unimportant things seem relevant. Keith would always listen to what he had to say.

This time was no different. Except, Keith wasn’t listening to him as they were wandering home. He still responded and appeared interested, but his thoughts were crowded with what Lance had said in the bar.

He had been explaining why he was always around where Keith was. It made sense. Sure, Keith wanted some space sometimes, but Lance did have a point. Some people just expressed their friendships different. While Lance would show up whenever with a fun activity in mind, Keith would disappear into his plant world and only reappear long after his old friends had forgotten about him at all. He was getting better at it though, seeing Pidge and Allura quite frequently.

That wasn’t what caught Keith’s notice either. It was the very specific part where Lance said that he believed Keith found him to be annoying. If that wasn’t enough, Lance was very right. Not about him being annoying, but about the fact that he could be anywhere else, lip-locked with anyone else. Lance thought he was annoying Keith, didn’t expect anything from him, and he still chose to seek Keith out every chance he got.

It set something off within him. A warmth in his stomach that he could mean that much to Lance, but also a hint of guilt at trying to get rid of him. And it wasn’t even that Keith didn’t enjoy the activities that he and Lance partook in, in fact, he always had fun, it was more about the act of getting there and working up the energy to actually get there at all. They were both just very different in their friendship styles, but that wasn’t bad.

And when Keith thought back on it, he was positive that never, not once, had the thought that Lance was annoying ever crossed his mind. Lance had never been anything but friendly, generous, trustworthy, funny, snarky, challenging, overdramatic, and extremely insistent. Annoying was never a word that appeared when Keith was describing Lance.

Keith’s thoughts filtered back to the two men who Lance had claimed were dating and how they were somehow different than he and Lance. Keith couldn’t see how they were different, how they looked different, _if_ they even looked different at all. Not that it mattered much. It really wasn’t a big deal to Keith whether or not people assumed he was dating Lance. Other people’s opinions had never meant that much to him in the first place.

Besides, Keith could never date anyone anyway. Even if he wanted to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Today marks the beginning of my winter break which slides right on into my exam break, so other than the studying I have, I will also have ample time to write more shitty fics. This is perfect.


	7. Just Plant One on Me

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, this is the chapter where that attempted rape tag comes into play. You have been warned.

Okay, so, maybe Lance was a little bit strange for frequenting the bookstore’s plant section even though he didn’t own a plant of any kind. It wasn’t like he was hoping to catch Keith there, in fact, he was hoping that Keith wouldn’t find him there. It had already happened on one occasion, which had thrown Lance off quite a bit, but he was getting better at determining if Keith was there or not before he waltzed into the aisle.

What was Keith even doing in the plant section? He owned a plant shop, shouldn’t he know everything already? And that was exactly why Lance was in the plant section in the first place too, because he knew jack shit about plants. It didn’t matter that he didn’t own one, he just wanted to know more about Keith’s interest. If he owned a plant store and named his plants, then he clearly cared about plants. Lance just wanted to be open to possible plant conversation. Why didn’t he just ask Keith about plants then, instead of lurking in the bookstore all the time? Well, Keith wouldn’t be nearly as impressed as he would if Lance just knew the stuff, now would he?

So, it stood to reason, that if Lance wanted to impress his plant-loving friend with his incredibly extensive plant knowledge, then he was going to have to learn some plant knowledge incredibly extensively. What better place to do so than in a bookstore. Just as long as he didn’t run into Keith again, then everything would be perfectly fine.

Lance sped-walked through the store, heading directly for the aisle that he had grown very familiar with after many days spent jogging around hunting it down. As soon as he neared, he slowed down and poked his head around the corner, the face of apprehension itself. Luckily for him, there was no Keith. Actually, there was no one in general, which made it even better. He giddily rushed into the aisle and began skimming through the sideways titles, his head tilted at an uncomfortable angle to accommodate.

There were many books of varying colours and sizes, all about different aspects of plants and plant care. Some of them were books that Lance had even seen behind the desk at Keith’s store, which Lance knew had to be good because there was no way that Keith would be able to keep all his plants so vibrant and healthy if the books were shams and frauds. He considered those books to be unspoken recommendations from an herbal expert.

It was true that Lance had already purchased a couple of the books from the section, but nothing too complex about how to garden or the specific way to care for a plant. He stuck to the easier ones about the general plant stats with lots of pictures so that he would be able to easily identify the plant when he came across it in real life. Just picturing it in his mind made Lance smile to himself;

_“Keith, you have the most beautiful garden I’ve ever seen, as though it isn’t even of this earth,” Lance sighs, as he tenderly touches the tip of a stunning purple flower. He glances to Keith from the corner of his eye._

_The boy is sitting up on the counter, staring down at Lance with a sparkle to his eyes, coy in nature. “Lance, you flatter me,” he purrs. A smile curls along his face so naturally and beautifully._

_“I wouldn’t say it if it weren’t true,” Lance grins back. “Take this flower, for example,” he gestures to a yellow bloom with red streaks like paintbrush strokes over the delicate petals. Lance trails his fingers along it gently, careful not to damage any single part of it. “A variegated tulip.”_

_Keith’s eyes-widen, impressed that Lance knows this. He hums, “You really know your flowers, huh?”_

_Lance plucks the tulip and saunters over to Keith, sliding up beside him with a flirty quirk to his lips. “That I do,” he responds smoothly. As he speaks, he reaches up to softly drag the flower over Keith’s cheek, staring at him through lidded eyes as he does. “This one means, ‘You have beautiful eyes.’” The look in his gaze is intense, conveying every emotion he feels._

_Keith is captivated, those same beautiful eyes that Lance can’t seem to get enough of stare back at him, shifting over Lance’s face and taking in every detail. His mouth is parted just slightly, enough that a single word passes through them, almost as if Keith isn’t aware he’s speaking at all, “Lance…”_

_He leans in, pulled forward by the electricity and the magnetism between them. Lance surges upwards to meet Keith halfway. Over the course of years, Lance has kissed many people, but he knows, even before he feels it, that this kiss is going to be one of the most important ones of his life, one of the best ones he’s ever experienced and will ever experience._

_Lance is so close, he can feel Keith’s breath ghosting over his lips, nervous, yet seductive. He can almost taste it, quite literally. Lance closes the distance, pressing his–_

“Lance?” a voice broke him out of his thoughts, crushing the fantasy he had been playing through in his mind. Lance spun around, confused. “It is you! I knew it!” the man exclaimed. He loomed over Lance, staring down at him with a twinkle in his eye.

Recognition hit Lance suddenly. He hadn’t realized where he had known the man at first, but now that he had gotten a better look at his face, he could vaguely place it. Around four months ago, maybe more, Lance had flirted with this guy, and, like many of his other encounters, had ended up making out with him. All the details escaped Lance, especially since the guy hadn’t been particularly skilled or memorable in any way, but he hadn’t expected to meet up with him again. He never did with anyone.

“Oh, hey…” Lance answered, a little bit dazed. He couldn’t even remember the guy’s name.

“It’s been awhile,” he continued, “I was beginning to think I’d never see you again.”

_I was hoping you wouldn’t_ , Lance thought to himself. “I’ve just been… busy…” he supplied. Lance began to back away, not wanting to be rude but also not wanting to let the guy continue to think that Lance was interested.

Ever since the moment at the corner store with Keith where Lance had his revelation, he hadn’t felt the need to flirt with anyone or to make out with anyone to fill the void. It wasn’t that he had sworn off of it because of Keith, it was almost like Keith had filled that void himself. He had given Lance something that replaced the momentary bliss that making out with someone provided him, except the replacement was whole and longer lasting, and it didn’t leave behind depressing feelings of self-loathing.

This man here didn’t offer Lance that, in fact, he could already feel the tendrils of dread threading their way around his neck, tightening and constricting him, rooting him to the spot.

“We should catch up,” the man suggested, in a tone that sent chills down Lance’s spine. That look in his eye hadn’t gone away, almost like he was saying more with his eyes than with his actual words. It was unnerving. Then there was a hand on his wrist, dragging him through the store. Lance couldn’t pull away, too paralyzed with fear. The grip he had on Lance was like a vice, not relenting or giving any leeway in the slightest, even as Lance roughly tried to pull away.

“I’m lucky I ran into you here!” the man called back, his fingers tightening. Lance winced at the increased pressure, but he couldn’t get his arm free. It began to occur to him that this wasn’t a friendly encounter and this wasn’t a chance to catch up like the guy was claiming. Then the real panic and alarm began to set in, but not before he was already pulled out of sight of the other people in the store.

 

◊ ◊ ◊

 

Keith had had enough, that was what he had concluded. People were really bad at taking care of plants, and if that wasn’t bad enough, they were even worse at reading and following directions or accepting that they didn’t know more about plants than Keith, who literally owned a plant store. One house plant that didn’t completely perish under your care, doesn’t make you an expert. When a plant wilts, it doesn’t mean that you should immediately water it, and Keith included pamphlets that stated what you should do. No one ever listened or read them, go figure.

It really didn’t help that Keith was at the end of his rope with these people and their inability to do anything he suggested they do. So, the second he hit closing time, Keith immediately packed up then bundled himself in his winter gear before heading to the bookstore. Books about plants, the universe, aliens, or murder mysteries always eased Keith’s stress. And, although Keith considered himself to be pretty in tune with plants – one might even say he was an expert on the subject – and he didn’t need to buy more plant books, he still enjoyed doing just that. There was something very comforting reading about the flowers that he tended too, and sometimes he even came across a new plant that he had never heard of or wasn’t able to keep due to the climate.

He hadn’t taken much time to really clean the shop up, or to even clean himself up before hurrying to the bookstore since he just desperately wanted to get away from the people who got on his nerves so readily. Usually they didn’t bother him that much, but today he just had a pissy sort of vibe about himself that he couldn’t shake, every little thing was just setting him off. Bookstores and books were calming though.

Well, they were calming when he wasn’t ruining them with his dirt-covered hands. He had found a book that seemed mildly interesting, but when he went to pick it up, a few crumbles of dirt had fallen from his fingernails and onto the book. That was Keith’s que to go wash his hands before he touched anything else. So, he put the book back and hightailed it to the bathroom at the back of the shop.

It was empty, luckily, since Keith was angry enough that if it were busy he might have just stomped his way through everyone. Picking the least clogged sink, Keith gripped the faucet handles and turned them, deciding that it really didn’t matter if he scorched his hands off or not. The scalding water cascaded over his hands, washing away the bits of dirt still clinging to him. It didn’t get rid of the black marks deep under his fingernails, near the nailbeds. He grumbled, jamming his hand into the soap dispenser to properly scrub at his fingers.

While he brushed at his hands, he let his eyes wander up to the mirror. By some miracle, he didn’t look nearly as worn-out as he felt. There were dark bags under his eyes; the only sign of his fatigue. Otherwise, Keith looked just as threatening and angry as he usually did. Glaring at a spot on his face, Keith rubbed at it, effectively removing the smudge of dirt on his cheek. He inspected his face for anymore dirt before deciding it was clear. Sighing, he turned the tap off and grabbed some paper towel from the dispenser on the wall next to the sink.

As he began to wipe his hands, a sound across the bathroom drew his attention in. He paused, listening. There was a clunk followed by a small whimper. Keith glanced back to glare at the stall near the back wall. Something slammed into the stall door and it creaked against the heavy weight. Panting could be heard, causing Keith to scrunch his face up in disgust as it began to dawn on him what exactly was happening. He swiftly turned on his heel. Throwing the paper towel into the garbage with one hand, and grabbing for the door with the other hand, Keith prepared to make his hasty exit.

_“Stop!”_ a gasping voice commanded. Keith froze instantly. He knew that voice. It was a voice that had been following him around for a month, a voice that had become a comfort for him, a friend to him. It belonged to a brilliant and exuberant man who lived across the street from Keith and took him on adventures outside his plant world that he never would have gone on otherwise. Lance.

Keith didn’t hesitate anymore, he turned again. “Lance?” he called.

There was a startled noise, followed by shuffling. “Keith?” Lance responded desperately.

Keith grimaced, “Fuck, Lance, I know you like to hookup, but in a bookstore bathroom? Really?”

Another banging noise came from the door and lock scraped, nearly snapping off entirely. _“No!_ Keith, help, please–”

“Shut up,” a different voice, one that Keith had never heard, hushed aggressively.

The tone of the voice kicked Keith into gear as he suddenly realized that wasn’t what he had previously thought it to be. Without another thought, Keith stormed across the bathroom, fury burning in his veins and overriding the fear he felt. The thought that Lance could be in danger struck such intense rage into Keith’s mind. All he could see was red. No one was going to hurt Lance in any way as long as Keith could help it.

Keith grabbed at the door, attempting to rip it open. It was locked from the inside though. Without wasting a second, Keith backed up and slammed his foot into the door, right below the lock. It snapped, allowing Keith to force his way in. The door flung inward, smacking into the wall on the other side and jarring the strange man who was latched to Lance, holding him against his will. Fuming, Keith grabbed Lance’s arm and yanked him from the stall. Lance stumbled a bit, taken aback and frightened. Keith didn’t even bother to give him a second look though, addressing the problem first and foremost.

_“You bastard! What the hell are you doing?!”_ Keith shouted, his voice booming as he advanced on the man in the stall. He was much taller than Keith, and probably could have incapacitated him if Keith weren’t careful, but Keith didn’t care, his limbs shook with adrenaline. “You have no idea what I’m going to do to you,” he hissed, his voice morphing inhumanely. His left hand came up to slam the guy backwards into the metal siding of the stall. It reverberated under his weight. The guy’s eyes widened, surprise with a hint of fear lacing them.

“What the fuck?” the man muttered. His eyes flickered to Lance before he spat, “I didn’t know you were already dating someone.” His tone was bitter.

Keith didn’t turn around to see Lance, but he could hear the nervous and dumbfounded way he corrected the man, “We’re not–”

Without giving him any chance to finish his sentence, Keith reared back his arm, then socked the man directly in the jaw, a clean right hook. The man cried out in pain as Keith’s fist slammed into his face, forced backwards with the power of the hit. His knees smacked into the toilet as he staggered, causing him to fall against the far wall. “Don’t _ever_ touch Lance again,” Keith barked, his eyes flaring with unrestrained anger.

“Keith, oh my god!” Lance inhaled, his hands instinctively moving to grab onto Keith’s shoulder.

The contact sparked Keith again. He whipped around, already yelling, “And what the fuck are you doing?!”

“What?” Lance sputtered out.

“This is what happens! This is why it’s dangerous! Not everyone is your friend, Lance, some people want to hurt you!” Keith shouted, throwing a very pointed look at the guy who was still struggling to pull himself back together in the bathroom stall.

A saddened and desperate look overcame Lance’s face. “That’s why I stopped!” he argued.

“You shouldn’t be so trusting!” Barreling on, Keith moved closer to Lance, reaching up to hold the other man’s face in his hands. “Are you okay? Are you hurt?” he interrogated, still sounding just as furious as ever.

Lance stared back at him, watching Keith as he inspected for any injuries. “I’m alright now, Keith… Can we just… go…”

Keith paused, letting his hands fall to his sides. He stopped studying Lance’s skin for any blemishes or bruises and instead took in Lance’s entire face as a whole. The exhausted downturn of his lips and the lazy slouch of his eyelids. A tired droopiness to his facial features made him look older overall. Even the light in his eyes looked spent, a dull sheen instead of its usual stunning shimmer. Sighing, Keith forced himself to calm and relax, if not for his own sake, then for Lance’s. A small smile worked its way onto his face, feeling awkward in nature.

“Yeah… Yeah, we can go. Do you wanna go back to my place? We can watch shitty movies and eat ramen noodles,” Keith suggested gently, his voice cracking from the sudden shift in volume.

Lance looked up to him then. He snorted, a sound which made Keith feel warm. “That sounds perfect,” Lance agreed.

As they left, Keith made sure to keep himself in between Lance and the bastard, even giving a searing look to the man in the stall as they passed. They left the bookstore immediately, heading straight to Keith’s house without any detours. Keith couldn’t help but glance over his shoulder whenever Lance wasn’t looking, just to be sure that they weren’t being trailed. They eventually made it to Keith’s apartment, and by that time, Lance seemed much more at ease, if a little bit tired.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Merry Christmas y'all.


	8. Constellation Prizes

Keith’s apartment was pretty big. He had all the space in his shop below too, which made his apartment seem even bigger since he could store things in the space below him. Keith didn’t own a lot of things anyway, he never had. Often times, Keith felt very alone in his house with so much empty space that he couldn’t even dream up something to fill it with. He never felt lonely though, at least that was what he told himself. Sometimes, the thought would cross his mind of how nice it would be to share his space with someone, but at the same time, his space was his own and he never had anyone who he could picture slipping into his apartment and remaining there until it became _their_ apartment.

That being said, sitting there in the darkness of his slightly oversized apartment with Lance, eating and watching television while exchanging noncommittal conversation, Keith couldn’t help but feel that his apartment had never been so small and closed in. It was almost claustrophobic, like no matter where in the building he went, he would always be close to Lance. Not in a bad way, but not in a comfortable way either. Lance seemed like someone who could fit into his life like a puzzle piece that had a matching shape but a mismatching picture. Close, but not quite.

“Why don’t you just pick one partner?” Keith asked, mixing around his ramen with his chopsticks. He stared into the discount Styrofoam container that had been sitting in the back of his cupboard for awhile now.

Lance was seated on the couch, facing Keith. His head was rested across the back of the couch as he stared down at the noodles in the cup. The only sound in the dark room had been the television, but at Keith’s voice, his eyes flickered up. Keith had never seen Lance looking so dead. Lance was always very full of life, but not this time. “It’s easier,” he answered softly.

Keith raised an eyebrow, a familiar feeling of pain and hatred bubbling up within him, but not for Lance. He tried his best to quell it down, reminding himself that Lance wasn’t the same as his father, they weren’t the same person. “You should be more careful at least,” he sighed, letting his anger dissipate with the breath he released. “Disgusting people like that do exist.” He removed his eyes from Lance and began slurping the noodles up, if only to give his body some energy. Although they had never been good, this particular night left a bad taste in his mouth that not even shitty gas station ramen noodles could eliminate.

“I know, but it wasn’t like that,” Lance insisted, his voice gaining back its lively quality.

“What was it like?” Keith asked, not understanding what Lance was talking about. He wanted to understand what would possess Lance to put himself out there in the way that he did, but Keith just couldn’t even imagine it.

Lance shuffled around in his seat, picking up a couple noodles on his fork before dropping them back into the cup with no intention of eating them. His cup was still mostly full, showcasing how little an appetite he had since returning to Keith’s darkened apartment. “I made out with him once, but it was a one-time thing. He knew that; I made it clear. Its been months! I didn’t think he’d come find me or… or force me into the bathroom…” his voice cracked at the end of his admission. The lights from the television made him look deathly pale against the black couch.

“I’m so sorry, Lance,” Keith whispered. Some part of him wanted to reach out for Lance, to comfort him in a way that Lance would appreciate, but he wasn’t sure how.

“It’s fine,” Lance nodded. “I’m not going to do that anymore, so you don’t have to worry.”

Keith stared at Lance, studying him, taking in every detail of his sunken, worn face. He just couldn’t understand what would make Lance do that in the first place. He couldn’t understand it when his father did it either. It didn’t make any sense, why have a dozen throw-away hookups with a bunch of people you don’t care about, when you could have meaningful relationships? He was glad that Lance had decided that he had had enough – it was more than Keith’s father had ever done – but it still scratched at the back of his mind.

Keith frowned, “Is it really that great?”

Lance, who was nibbling at his noodles, slowed the grinding of his jaw. His eyebrows knitted in confusion. “Huh?”

“Flirting and making out with anyone willing,” Keith clarified. “You could get the same thing from a stable relationship.”

Lance didn’t speak momentarily, just contemplating the words that Keith had put out there. The look on his face was conflicted, and Keith got the sense that there was something he was missing, a piece to the puzzle that he hadn’t been informed of. Lance placed his fork back into his ramen cup and shifted in his seat once again, no longer leaning his head against the couch. “Why don’t you want a relationship?” he asked, completely side-stepping Keith’s original question.

Keith wasn’t expecting that, hardly even paying attention to how blatantly his question was ignored. He met Lance’s eye contact, but it quickly became too much and he had to look away before Lance’s eyes drilled holes through him, reading everything that Keith had kept so tightly under lock and key within himself. The longer he stayed by Lance’s side, the faster he could feel his walls crumbling, and it scared him.

His eyes trailed along the carpet, catching on every fibre that was out of place, stalling, looking for anything to distract himself and Lance until he could return with a suitable answer. Finally, his eyes landed on the television. It was playing some old black and white movie that had been on one of the more obscure channels. Christmas was nearing so it was probably _It’s a Wonderful Life,_ or something. Not like Keith was paying attention, it was more background noise than anything, a way to fill the silence without talking.

“Romance is just a waste of time. It’s annoying,” he settled on, glaring pointedly at the film. His voice didn’t waver, which he impressed himself with.

Lance’s eyes were on him, Keith could feel it, he could sense it. He didn’t turn though, pretending that he was suddenly invested in the show just so that he wouldn’t have to face the question that Lance had passed. “That’s a lie,” Lance replied calmly, stating it as though he were an expert on the topic, as though he could see Keith’s thoughts. And what was worse was that he probably could. Lance was a very intuitive man, despite how he seemed, and Keith had let him force his way into Keith’s life. “I think it’s because you’re scared to become like your father.”

Keith’s blood ran cold, but he kept his eyes trained on the television, refusing to give Lance a reaction that might indicate that he was right. Because he was. Keith was scared. He was scared of a lot of things about his father, but most of that he could become the same as him. He would never admit it out loud, and he had never admitted it, but it was true.

“I don’t know what he did, Keith, but I know you hate yourself because of it. I can see it, especially when you smoke,” Lance explained, his eyes still trained on Keith and his voice remorseful. “Do you do that to remember him?” Lance almost whispered, amplified by the dead silence of the room, coagulating in the air between them. The words echoed within Keith’s head like a taught.

“I get it…” Keith sighed, knowing that every word Lance said was true. And maybe Keith did hate himself, maybe he really was afraid to get hurt or to hurt someone else, maybe he did only smoke so the memory of the father he hated so much would never truly disappear. But honestly, Keith really didn’t need to hear it out loud, verbalized in such a way that made it all too real. In the confines of Keith’s mind, he could feel all the emotions and have his own reasons for them, he could ask himself why he was the way he was and have an answer, but when it was spoken, and by someone else aside from himself, it was different. It was harder to swallow.

Lance must have realized from the broken and defeated tone that Keith used that he had gone too far and had dug too deep. He backpedaled, a slight panic in his voice. “Keith, I didn’t mean–”

“Lance, I said, ‘I get it,’” Keith stated a little bit louder, a little bit more forceful, cutting directly over Lance’s sentence. He didn’t want to hear anymore. He turned to Lance, seeing the expression on his face as one of wanting to rectify the situation but not know how to. “Your ramen is getting cold,” Keith’s voice was hard. He jutted his chin out to Lance’s food before facing the television again and trying his hardest to invest himself in the storyline while tuning out all the feelings and memories Lance had unintentionally incited.

Keith knew he should address those, but he had left it to fester for fifteen years, he could leave it for another fifteen.

The tension between them was alive, moving and breathing down Keith’s neck, raising the hairs there. Lance opened his mouth, Keith could hear it, but he didn’t speak. His teeth clacked when he shut his mouth. The couch shuffled and the mashing of noodles started up again, signalling that the conversation was done, much to Keith’s relief.

They sat like that for some time before Lance began making jokes relating to the movie in front of them. At first, Keith hadn’t been into it, but slowly, he allowed his mind to clear and found himself cackling alongside Lance, forgetting all about what had transpired earlier. Keith much preferred filling himself up with the warmth that shitty noodles, old Christmas movies, and the company of the funniest person he knew, all had to offer him. That, he had to say, was infinitely better than dwelling on his depressing past.

 

◊ ◊ ◊

 

_“Keith, it’s time for bed. Get off the roof,” Shiro called, his head poking through the window to stare up at his younger brother._

_“Just a couple more minutes?” Keith pleaded. He could stay up later, it wasn’t that big a deal. Sure, he had school the next day, but he was already ten years old, double digits, he didn’t need to be coddled._

_Shiro strained his neck, struggling to see Keith over the edge of the eavestrough. “No, you have to get up early tomorrow and if you stay up too late, you won’t be able to make it through the day.”_

_Shiro was always giving lectures on how to be healthy and safe, Keith had heard it a thousand times. If he wanted, he could probably mouth the words along as Shiro spoke them, perfectly in sync. Keith groaned as loudly and dramatically as he was capable of, draping his body over the shingles of the roof even though Shiro could hardly see him. “Isn’t that what breakfast’s for?”_

_“That’s not how it works,” Shiro countered._

_“Yeah,” Keith whined, “you told me that breakfast gave me energy for the day!”_

_He could hear Shiro sigh from his spot at the window, exasperated with Keith’s stubbornness but still able to remain patient. “You can’t replace sleep with food, Keith,” he frowned._

_“So many rules…” Keith muttered, more to himself than anyone else._

_Shiro still heard him. “They’re rules that have to be followed. Come down from there, you’re going to fall one day.”_

_“You sound like mom,” Keith called. Ignoring Shiro’s request, Keith stared up at the stars while making no effort to move. He let his eyes flicker over the various constellations, not able to remember exactly which one was which, but knowing that they were there somewhere. His father was very good with constellations, always telling him stories and legends about the stars and how they came to be in the night sky._

_That is, when he was home at all. Keith’s father was often gone. He never knew where the man went, just that every time he left, it took him longer to return, and everyone else in the family seemed more and more distant from him. Keith knew something was up, but he didn’t know what. All he did know was that he missed his father, so he would study the stars until father returned, intent on impressing him with his extensive star knowledge and making his father proud. Really, he just wanted to hang out with his father._

_“Shiro, let me,” Acxa piped up._

_Acxa, Keith and Shiro’s sister, was a very intimidating girl. She could do some pretty intense glares and stares if she needed to, and even Shiro was unsettled by them. Their entire family was a little bit on the scary side in terms of appearance, but Acxa had her powers mastered by the age of thirteen._

_That wasn’t to say she was nothing but a threatening demon, because she wasn’t. Acxa cared deeply for her family, even if she didn’t know how to express it. She was much like Keith in that regard. They were both two sides of the same coin. They looked a lot alike, they both had similar mannerisms and speech patterns, and they both fumbled when it came to expressing emotion or interpreting social situations. These similarities made them very close, even with their three year age gap._

_Shiro sighed from his spot at the window, extracting himself from the opening. He said something to Acxa which Keith couldn’t make out, then he was gone. At least, Keith assumed he was gone. Acxa propped up her feet on the windowsill and shimmied his way around until she could hoist herself up onto the roof. Securing a foothold, she gracefully climbed up to sit next to Keith on the flatter part of the roof, her messy bob swaying as she settled down. Keith scooted over a bit to make some room, all though he couldn’t go far since the flat area was fairly small._

_She didn’t say anything at first. She never did, usually preferring to let others grow accustomed to her presence before she spoke, not ever one to jump straight into conversation. Then, once she was ready, she lifted her hand to point up into the night sky, and she uttered in a low voice, “That constellation is called the Crater. In the story, Apollo sends his pet crow out with a cup to get some water, but the crow gets distracted by a fig tree and spends all his time waiting for it to ripen. When he finally does get back to Apollo, he blames a water snake for him being late, but Apollo knows the truth, so he traps them in the sky.”_

_“Why’s the constellation called ‘the Crater’ then?” Keith pondered, trailing the stars with his eyes._

_“The cup was the crater,” Acxa informed him._

_Keith snorted, “Apollo trapped the cup in the sky too?”_

_Acxa released a huff of a laugh too, “Yeah, I guess he did.”_

_“That’s sort of ridiculous,” Keith admitted, smiling gently at the sky above. “You’re not very good at telling the stories.”_

_Acxa jabbed her elbow at him with a grunt, glaring as she did. “I’m trying to be nice, asshat,” she grumbled. “I know you miss dad, and he does these stories for you. I just looked this story up online a couple minutes ago, that might not even be the right constellation.”_

_Keith’s mood dropped, he tried his best to pretend that he was fine in front of his sister, but it was true, he did miss his father. The sentiment was still there and he appreciated her attempt to cheer him up. “Acxa?” he called out to her softly._

_She hummed, keeping her face pointed to the sky as well. Her voice got lost in the rustling wind that filtered across the roof, shaking the nearby trees._

_“When is dad coming home?” Keith asked, his eyebrows furrowing. He tried his best to see the outline of a cup amongst the stars, but it really wasn’t there, he couldn’t find it._

_Acxa was quiet for a long time, Keith even started to wonder if she had heard him, but finally, she sighed, “I don’t know…”_

_Keith frowned, not satisfied with that answer. He turned to stare at her, imploring her to give him a little bit more detail, but she just turned to stare back at him, not answering. Her hands, which were rested neatly on her stomach, twitched in the cool breeze. “Why is he always leaving? Where does he go?”_

_Acxa glanced away, a conflicted look of guilt and anger on her face. “Dad is busy playing with girls…” she settled on, her voice bitter and her words controlled._

_Studying her face for a moment, Keith let his face fall, matching the melancholy feeling in his heart. “I wanna play with dad too…” he muttered. The wind wasn’t too bad but he convinced himself that it was because of the wind that he was curling up farther into his coat._

_A grim laugh escaped Acxa and she shuffled closer to Keith, a soft smile on her face. “Not like that, Keith,” she said remorsefully._

_“Oh…”_

_“Yeah…” Keith could hear her grind her teeth together thoughtfully. “If we go to sleep now, maybe he’ll be there in the morning,” she suggested._

_“Yeah, maybe…” Keith answered. He knew his father wouldn’t be there, he knew it didn’t work that way, he knew his sister was just saying that to get him off the roof and into bed, but he still couldn’t help the whisper of hope in his chest that allowed him to believe._

_Maybe, just maybe, dad really would be there when he woke up. But, just like all the other countless amounts of times Keith let himself believe, his dad wasn’t there._


	9. A-Part-Meant Just for You

It had been a month since the incident at the bookstore, an incident which Lance was, frankly, trying his best to forget. Christmas had come and gone, New Years had passed, and Lance was going great. He was happy and that was all he could really ask. Keith had started to ask him if he wanted to hang out sometimes instead of it just always being Lance doing the asking. It warmed his heart to see Keith making the effort. And he was, Keith was making an effort, it was very clear in the angry expression he made when he barrelled through the question. Keith was nervous, but he was trying.

Lance was still working on that crush too. It was going very well for him, he was working it back down to admiration with no romantic feelings, just platonic ones. Soon, he would be able to proudly call Keith his friend without having the lingering pain in his heart that begged for more.

No, that was a lie. Keith was more attractive than ever and Lance wanted to strangle him every time he did something that sent Lance’s heart back into the downward spiral of feelings. It really didn’t help that they had begun to stay overnight at each others’ apartment more often, or that Lance had formally met Keith’s friends and hung out with them, or that Hunk had begun to catch onto Lance’s emotions towards Keith. These were all bad signs, but he told himself that he had it under control.

Well, he did have it all under control, that is, until he found out that the man who owned the pharmacy below him and rented him his apartment was going to be selling the building. He was moving, which meant that Lance was also going to have to move. To where, was the question. Lance didn’t have money to get a big fancy apartment closer to the centre of town, that would mess up his commute to work too, seeing as all of those places were so far away. There weren’t any houses in the area that were for sale either. He had just moved to the area, and now he had to move again? This was a disaster. And on top of it all, he had a little over a month to find somewhere else. That wasn’t nearly enough time, but the pharmacist couldn’t get him anymore time past that.

He paced outside his apartment building, staring at the notice that the pharmacist had left up for him. All the details were right there, easy to read, no mistaking it. And yet, Lance continued to go back to it and check it again, hoping that maybe it had changed in the last seven seconds since he had last checked. It never did, obviously, but Lance was actually beginning to panic.

“Alright, Lance, this is fine. Find a new apartment. That’s all you have to do. Nothing too hard, just simple apartment-hunting…” he muttered to himself. A newfound confidence and sense of control pumped through his veins. He spun around, propping his arms akimbo and staring down the street, the eyes of a real estate hawk. If there was a for sale sign in the immediate vicinity, he would catch it. Nothing would escape his watchful eye. Sales and deals were his game, his expertise, he could get a cheaper apartment in a day, forget a month. They didn’t call him the tailor for nothing, what, with the way he was always threading the needle on those housing deals and buying–

“I’m gonna be homeless!” he cried, instantly dropping himself onto the sidewalk with a dejected wail. All confidence left him in an instant.

“I was going to invite you over to help me water my plants, but if this is a bad time…” Keith’s voice suddenly broke through the haze of his rambling thoughts.

Lance whipped his head around to stare up at Keith in his jacket and beanie. He was watching Lance right back, a confused and slightly worried expression in his eyes. “Keith!” Lance bellowed. “What am I going to do?!”

“What’re you going to do about what? Why’re you on the ground?” Keith interrogated, squinting at the man before him.

Lance released a series of noises that could have been a language, maybe. He jabbed an accusing finger to the building where the notice was taped. “I’m getting _evicted!”_

Keith’s eyebrows shot up and he glanced over at the notice, then once more at Lance still sitting on the concrete, before finally deciding to humour Lance. He wandered over to the building and snatched the notice off the door where it was stuck. His bangs hung low in his face as he read it, swaying when a light breeze fluttered by. His eyebrows furrowed the more he read.

Finally, he snapped his head up to glare towards Lance, although not actually at Lance. “A month isn’t a lot of time,” he pointed out.

Lance whined, “I know! Keith! What am I supposed to do?! I can’t afford a fancy apartment but all the cheap ones are taken!”

Keith studied the notice once more, then he stepped closer to Lance and offered a gloved hand to him. “For starters, you should get off the ground.” Lance accepted the hand in front of him, using Keith’s weight to pull himself to his feet with a grunt. “You could go down to the real estate office on Daibazaal boulevard and see what’s available in the area,” he suggested, his head tilting in the adorable way it did when he wasn’t sure about an idea he had.

“Yes, yes! That’s good!” Lance exclaimed. His thoughts rapidly darkened again. “But can I get an apartment in a month?”

“Could you call your parents until you find a place?” Keith asked, staring off into the middle distance with a disgruntled expression.

Lance gasped, “Why didn’t I think of that?” He immediately pulled his phone out of his pocket, nearly dropping it in his haste. Calling the home phone, he jammed it against his ear and listened to the dial tone. Each ring felt agonizingly slow. He glanced over to Keith, who was once more reading the notice that he had torn down.

The phone clicked. _“Hello?”_ a young voice answered.

Lance recognized his younger sister instantly and smiled as he spoke into the receiver, “Noelia! Hey, it’s me!”

 _“Lance, hi! What’s up?”_ she asked cheerfully, blissfully unaware of Lance’s trouble.

“I’m homeless!” Lance cried. He was being a little bit dramatic, but he felt it was founded.

 _“What do you mean you’re homeless?!”_ she shouted, her tone changing immediately.

“You’re not homeless, Lance,” Keith called from his place leaning against the building. It wasn’t loud enough that Noelia could hear, but Lance could. In fact, he could practically hear the eye roll in Keith’s tone.

Lance glared at him, then huffed into the phone, “Okay, no, I’m not homeless yet.”

 _“Oh, thank goodness,”_ Noelia breathed.

Lance continued on anyway, “But I’m going to be! The guy who rents me my apartment is moving and I have to move out!”

Noelia paused for a moment. Lance moved the phone away from his face to check if she had hung up or not, but she hadn’t. _“Okay… So, what’s the issue?”_ she asked in her moody teenager voice, clearly missing the point of Lance’s phone call.

Groaning, Lance slumped his body, gesturing wildly to illustrate his point, as if she could see him. _“The issue,_ Noelia, glad you asked, is that I have nowhere to go! I’m gonna go look for new apartments, but I need a place to stay until then. Ask _mamá_ if I can come home!”

 _“Why can’t_ you _ask her?”_ she complained.

“Because _you_ answered the phone,” Lance said, as though it was obvious.

She clicked her tongue into the phone, _“You could have asked if she was around.”_

Lance scoffed, “If it’s such an issue for you, then just give the phone to _mamá.”_

Noelia whined, using all her breath to hold it for as long as she could, but Lance could hear as she wandered through the house to find their mother. Finally, the whining stopped and she quickly spoke into the phone again, _“Okay, found her, bye!”_

There was a shuffling noise as the phone was passed over, then his mother’s voice came through the phone, _“Hello? Who is this?”_

 _“Mamá!”_ Lance greeted excitedly.

 _“Oh!_ ¡Lance, mi hijo! _How are you?”_ she enthusiastically replied. He could hear the smile in her voice which caused him to smile too.

Lance hesitated, not wanting to ruin his mother’s happiness, but desperation was setting in. “Hey, _mamá_. So, don’t freak out or anything, but I’m being evicted from my apartment because the guy who owns it is moving and selling the building, and I need a place to stay until I can find a new apartment!” he blurted out quickly.

 _“Lance, that’s terrible!”_ his mother cried. _“But there’s no room here anymore. Your room is storage now and we renovated Valeria’s room a year ago, it’s my workout room,”_ she informed him remorsefully.

His mouth hanging open for a moment, unsure of what to say, he stuttered out a miserable, “Are you sure there’s nowhere I can stay…? Just for a month, _mamá,_ please?”

She made a contemplative noise into the phone, thinking about any options that might be available. _“I’m sorry, love, but unless you want to sleep on the couch, there’s no space. Oh! There’s the air mattress?”_

“Lance?” a tentative voice spoke up. Lance almost jumped out of his skin as he spun around. He had been so engrossed in his predicament and the conversation he was having on the phone that he had completely forgot that Keith was even there at all. With his hands shoved deep into his pockets and his shoulders up to his ears – Lance wasn’t sure if those were because of the cold or his nerves – Keith glanced around the street with a disgruntled furrow to his eyebrows. “My apartment is pretty big, so I have room, y’know, if you really have nowhere to go...” he mumbled out.

The words sent an instant feeling of relief, gratitude, and adoration flooding through his veins. “Keith, are you serious?!” he yelled, forgetting all sense of volume control in his excitement.

“Yeah, of course,” Keith replied. The way he said it seemed like it was the most natural thing, as though Lance was ridiculous for even questioning Keith’s offer.

 _“Keith? Who’s Keith? Lance, are you talking to someone else?”_ Lance’s mother asked. Lance had forgotten he was still on the phone. He wasn’t very good at keeping up multiple conversations.

He turned his attention back to the phone, unable to keep the smile out of his voice, “Sorry, _mamá!_ Yeah, Keith is– Well, he’s my new roomie now!” He stared pointedly at Keith, grinning. Keith returned the smile, although much more subdued and gentle. “Wow, this is great! No need to worry anymore, _mamá_ , it’s all sorted! Team Lance and Keith have got it all worked out!” he laughed.

“¡Gracias a Dios! _That’s wonderful, Lance! I’ll have to meet this ‘Keith.’ In fact, come over for dinner tonight, bring him along! Oh, Lance, it’s been so long since we’ve had a dinner all together! I’ll call Valeria too!”_ his mother cheered, exciting herself with the idea of a family dinner.

Lance, still smiling, laughed, “Alright, we’ll be there!” He hadn’t actually asked Keith yet, but there was no way Keith was getting out of it, not after he had just saved Lance’s life.

 _“Dinner will be at 7:00! Don’t try to get out of it now, Lance! I have to go call Valeria now, so I’ll let you go._ Hasta después. Te queiro, Lance,” she bid him farewell.

 _“Te queiro,”_ Lance answered back. Then the call ended and Lance shoved his phone into his pocket, turning to properly face Keith again. “You’re sure I can stay with you?” he asked.

Keith nodded, “As long as you help me with the plants and make dinner sometimes, then yeah, you can move in.”

Lance practically tackled him into a hug, grinning and laughing brightly as he did. “Thank you so much! You have saved my life, you have no idea!”

Keith staggered, not sure how to react to the affection but attempting to return it as best he could with an awkward pat to Lance’s back. “It’s not a big deal,” he replied. His voice wavered a little bit.

“It is a big deal! Such a big deal, in fact, that my mom is inviting us both over for dinner tonight and you can’t say no because it’s decided!” Lance shouted out, all in one breath. He pulled away from the hug to gauge Keith’s reaction.

“Wait, dinner?” Keith asked, his eyes widening.

“Yup!” Lance nodded. He was still holding onto Keith’s arms so that the man wouldn’t be able to bolt. Keith had tried to do that before.

Keith anxiously shifted his shoulders. “With your family?”

Lance, again, nodded, “Yes!”

“Tonight…?” It was beginning to sound like Keith was going to say no and Lance really hoped he didn’t. Especially since he didn’t want to have to call his mother back and tell her that Keith couldn’t make it. Also, he wanted Keith to meet his family. They were friends and that’s what friends did.

“Tonight,” Lance confirmed.

“I mean… I guess I could go…” Keith debated. He sounded like he was trying to be excited about it.

Lance felt a dangerous amount of excitement spike in his chest and he pulled Keith into a hug again. “They’re going to love you!” he cheered as he pulled away. He was just too excited for his own good, it was almost alarming. It seemed to be rubbing off on Keith though, because he was smiling and relaxing the longer they stood there.

“It’s only for the free food though,” Keith clarified, raising an eyebrow.

Lance snorted, “I’m sure it is, you softie!” he teased. It didn’t work with the smile he wasn’t able to keep off his face, but he didn’t care. Keith didn’t say anything back, just smiling at Lance in a way that he could almost deem as being fond. Lance’s heart felt like it was about to burst. He had to get away from Keith before he did something stupid like kiss him or whatever. “I should get packing! I have to sell a lot of my furniture, now that I think about it,” Lance pondered out loud. “I don’t think we’ll need two couches…”

“I should start cleaning out your room too,” Keith agreed, glancing pointedly at his apartment across the street. “What time are we leaving for your house?”

“We have to be there by 7:00, so I’ll come by around 6:00 to pick you up. We need time to catch the train, and I don’t know if you have a pass or not, but you’re going to need one,” Lance decided.

Keith pursed his lips momentarily before looking to Lance. “I have a motorbike we can take instead.”

Lance felt like he had just had his entire life altered, flipped upside down. Okay. Keith could be adorable, like a soft, sleepy kitten that just wanted to curl up in a blanket and nap. Keith could be a hot badass who stormed into bathrooms and decked people for looking at Lance wrong. Keith could be a sly, teasing, fox of a man who smirked while he drank his Pabst and then kicked Lance’s ass at pool. Keith could be an outrageous conspiracy theorist who believed in aliens and government coverups so passionately it was almost concerning. Keith could be a soft, gentle plant boy who whispered to the flowers in his shop when he thought he was alone or out of earshot.

That was fine.

What was not fine, was Keith driving a motorcycle. That was just too much for Lance. A line had to be drawn somewhere. Someone had to stand up and say, _‘Keith, you’re just too attractive. You need to stop.’_ And Lance was starting to think that he might have to be that person, because if things continued the way they were currently going, then Lance was going to find himself in quite the predicament. His plan to get over Keith was at a steady no steps forward, seven steps back, as long as Keith continued to look him in the eye and tell Lance casually attractive things about himself.

Yet, there he was, agreeing to this plan. Agreeing to it as if he wasn’t about to spontaneously combust on the spot. And he hadn’t even thought about how close to Keith he would be should he accept. It was too late for that.

“Yeah, that sounds good. It would be faster than the train anyway,” he assented in a nonchalant tone. He didn’t even have time to be impressed with how even his voice came out when he was busy trying to hear Keith’s response over the screeching in his mind.

“Alright, see you at 6:00 then,” Keith affirmed. Then he was off, across the street and back to his apartment, presumably to water the plants and clean the room until dinner time rolled around.

Once he was out of sight, Lance released such a heavy breath that one would wonder if he was suffocating. He might as well have been. If Lance was being honest with himself and his feelings – which he rarely ever was – he was going to have to really pull himself together before dinner. Not to mention that he would soon be moving in with this man. He would be living with him. He would be seeing him every day. And every night. Technically, he would have someone to come home to. He would come home to Keith. Instead of inviting himself wherever Keith was, he would literally be able to just wander on in and spend every night with Keith. Wow.

Lance really dug a hole on this one.


	10. They Grow on You

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am sorry this is so late, but I had a plane to catch this morning and this is the first chance I've gotten to actually post anything, so here you go.  
> And now, let's watch me, a non-Spanish speaking person, attempt to write Spanish. I did hours worth of research for like five lines of dialogue and it's still going to be wrong, just watch. Also, my family is so wildly reserved and introverted, like we never invite people over, we hardly see each other, even if we're all at home, so I'm not really sure how a big social family like Lance's would act, forgive me.

“How do I,” Lance’s voice drew Keith’s attention to see as the man gestured to the bike widely before turning to Keith with a furrow to his eyebrows, “get on it…?”

Keith, who was securing his helmet to his head, jutted his chin to a helmet that was sitting against the side of the building in a case. “Go put your helmet on first,” he directed. He tucked the straps up into the helmet rather than actually doing it up properly.

Lance glanced over to the wall where the helmet was, then huffed a laugh, “Oh, ha, I knew that.” He hurried over to grab the helmet. Keith was relieved when it easily slipped onto Lance’s head without a problem because he had been wondering if the spare helmet he kept would fit.

Lance turned back to Keith with his giant helmet on, behaving like a bobblehead until he got used to the weight. When Lance lifted a hand up to give Keith a thumbs-up, Keith couldn’t help but chuckle. “You can open the visor, you dip,” he snorted, flipping Lance’s visor up for him and giving him an amused look when Lance’s bright eyes became visible again, although Lance couldn’t see it through Keith’s helmet.

“It’s more mysterious when the visor is down, though!” Lance argued, his voice muffled against the mouth guard. As he spoke, his eyebrows wiggled underneath the helmet. Keith was glad he had his own helmet on to hide the grin that forced its way along his face.

Without another word, Keith slammed Lance’s visor back down, then clicked his own into place. He kicked his leg over the side of his slick, bright red motorcycle, straddling the sturdy black leather of the seat. A sigh escaped him. He rarely got a chance to use his bike in the winter since the roads were icy and he had been going through a withdrawal. Keith’s bike was probably his most prized possession, and he loved it to death. Between his bike and his plants, Keith didn’t have any other wants in his life, he was perfectly happy and content when it came down to it.

Keith didn’t have an actual garage since most of the building he lived in was used for his plants, but there was a small section at the back that could be considered a garage if your intentions weren’t to put a car in it. Really, it was more of a shed, but Keith fixed it up, cleaned it out, and installed a light, so it was pretty much a garage now. It was where he stored his beautiful red babe, anyway.

Unconsciously, Keith reached out a hand to rub it along the glossy finish of his candy apple coloured bike, humming happily. The snow was thankfully clear enough that Keith hadn’t even had to consider the roads when he had suggested taking his bike to Lance’s family home. First ride of the year and Keith was practically vibrating with excitement. Internally, of course, he didn’t need Lance making fun of him for getting so wound up over a bike ride.

Speaking of Lance, Keith turned back to see what was taking him so long. As nervous as Keith was to meet Lance’s family, he was still itching to go. Lance was just sort of standing there, staring at Keith. His helmet being full face meant that Keith couldn’t even tell what Lance’s expression might be or what he might be thinking. Hopefully he wasn’t thinking that Keith was getting weird with his bike. Shiro had told him once that the way he acted around the thing wasn’t normal, like he was too into it. But, whatever it was, Lance seemed to hesitantly get over it as he shuffled forward and awkwardly placed his hands on Keith’s shoulders.

“Is there even enough space for us both…?” he muttered, more to himself than to Keith as he settled down onto the seat. Once he was seated, Keith began to realize that Lance was kind of right, there wasn’t a lot of room. It wasn’t like Keith hadn’t ever driven anyone on his bike before, because he had. Pidge was always catching rides with him and Allura had even gone with him before, but it was never like this. Keith was positive that he would have noticed such a warm press along his thighs and his back, like a space heater but with a feeling of electricity.

Huh. Keith tried to convince himself that it was just because it was Lance’s first ride on Keith’s bike so it was a new experience for both of them, and he had just forgotten what someone riding with him was like. That’s all.

“Are you going to hold on or are you planning to fall off and die?” Keith called over his shoulder, making sure he was louder to accommodate for the barrier of the helmets.

“Oh, right!” Lance exclaimed. The man’s arms hesitantly looped around Keith’s torso, locking in place. If Keith didn’t know any better, he’d think that Lance was nervous from the way he twitched when his hands settled down. “No problem!” Lance asserted. Keith wasn’t sure if Lance was talking to him or himself, but he wasn’t too worried about it either because he was busy focused on the fact that the weird warm electric feeling had returned once Lance had latched on.

“Good?” Keith asked, starting up the motor. It rumbled beneath him, kicking starting his heart and furthering his anticipation.

Lance stuck his hand out in front of Keith, giving another thumbs-up. “Good!” he answered.

Keith didn’t bother with anything that might prolong the wait, he immediately revved the bike and slammed his foot into the kickstand. He released the brake, then they shot off down the road and away from Keith’s shop. Lance yelped at the sudden acceleration, nervously laughing in fear as they continued down the road. Keith could feel Lance’s arms digging into him and holding on as tight as he was able, probably too tight. Keith didn’t complain though, it wasn’t all that bad.

Luckily, Keith wasn’t expecting Lance to give him directions or anything. He had been sure to have Lance give him the address beforehand so he could look it up and map out a route. It wasn’t nearly as out of the way as Keith had been thinking it would be. At first, Keith was disappointed because it meant less time on his bike, but he was coming to realize now that it was actually a good thing because he wasn’t getting accustomed Lance’s warmth like he had thought he would, it was still electrifying and different.

It was also good because Keith was surprisingly anxious about meeting Lance’s family and this gave him less time to dwell. He wasn’t often asked to meet other people’s family members. Sure, he knew Pidge’s family, consisting of her brother, Matt, and her parents, Sam and Colleen, and he had also met Allura’s father, Alfor, and her uncle, Coran, but this was different. With them, he hadn’t actually gone over to their house, they had just briefly been introduced and that was that. Keith had been invited over to Lance’s house before they even knew he existed in Lance’s life, and Keith really only had existed in Lance’s life for a few months. He had been friends with Pidge for years before he even knew the names of her family members.

Which, now that Keith thought about it, reminded him of a completely different issue with this trip; Keith didn’t know the names of anyone in Lance’s family. And he couldn’t ask Lance on a bike. Would asking for a quick lesson outside his house be weird? Had Lance even considered this problem before? Was he just supposed to introduce himself to all of them like he would with any other stranger? No, but, Lance had already told them his name. They knew his name and he didn’t know theirs, fuck. He could get away with Mr. and Mrs. Sanchez, but what about his siblings? Sanchez Sibling One…? Nope, never mind, shut that idea down immediately.

Keith hadn’t even realized how far they had travelled in the time it took him to get lost in his worries. They were already about two blocks from Lance’s house, and if he didn’t already know the address, he would be able to tell from the fact that Lance was suddenly dancing in his seat. Keith studied the sides of the houses, searching for the number, until he finally found it. Not that it was hard, what, with Lance practically leaping off the bike before Keith had even stopped the thing.

Keith parked the bike in the driveway of the house, turning it off and putting down the kickstand, making sure everything was alright, but Lance hadn’t bothered to stick around. His eagerness to see his family was obvious in the way he ripped his helmet off and placed it on the ground next to the bike before scurrying off to go greet them. Keith couldn’t help but smile and shake his head as he peeled off his helmet. As Keith picked up the extra helmet off the ground and made his way toward the house, he could hear talking, but he couldn’t make out any specific words. His nerves returned in waves and his feet hesitated as he got closer to the front door.

“I’m getting ahead of myself!” he heard Lance laugh to the people inside. Then the boy came rushing out the door once again to stop in front of Keith with the biggest smile on his face. “Keith, come meet my family! They don’t bite, I promise!” But Lance was already grabbing his wrist and dragging him away before he even had time to agree.

As Keith stumbled through the threshold of the door, a sudden barrage hit him. A barrage of smells; dinner in the kitchen being cooked, various spices and scents coming together. A barrage of sounds; Lance’s family members energetically greeting him, the distant sound of a television, pots and pans being clinked. A barrage of movement; Lance grabbing the helmets from Keith’s hands, someone tugging on his arm, people urging him inside. It was all very overwhelming. Keith didn’t even have time to stutter out a single word before people were already pouncing on him with questions.

“You must be the new roommate!” an older woman grinned.

“Do you drive a motorcycle?! Can I have a ride?!” the boy yanking his arm cried out excitedly.

“Is that Keith?! Bring him here, I want to see what he looks like!” a lady from the kitchen called.

One teenage girl, who had just been staring at him with her face red and her eyes blown wide, immediately glanced away when Keith eventually got around to making eye contact with her.

“Keith! Great to meet you!” a man, who Keith assumed was Lance’s father, greeted. He let out a hearty laugh before pulling Keith into a side-hug.

All Keith had done up to this point was awkwardly stand there and let himself be smothered by people. Lance’s family was very similarly sized to his own family. Aside from Lance’s extra sister and the fact that his father wasn’t absent half the time, they were pretty much the same, both from fairly large families. Except there was a difference, a huge difference; where Lance’s family was loud and boisterous, warm and welcoming, bright and full of life, Keith’s family was quiet and subdued, cold and standoffish, dark and dreary. This was nothing like what Keith had been expecting when he had accepted the invitation, but he began to realize that that was foolish of him considering that Lance’s energetic and upbeat personality had to come from somewhere.

Keith was starting to wish that Lance’s energetic and upbeat personality would come save him from this disastrous social interaction that Keith was currently tanking.

Lance must have been able to read minds because he immediately swooped in and scooped Keith away from his father, spinning him around so he was facing Lance’s family with Lance’s arm around his neck. “How about we let Keith settle in and then we can bombard him with questions?”

To Keith’s surprise, that easily dispersed everyone back towards the living room and the kitchen. Keith hummed lightly to himself, then he swiftly removed his boots and lined them up against the wall. He wasn’t wearing his heavy winter coat anymore since it was warming up outside, but he still had on his red leather biking jacket, which he decided to take off after much debate. His fingerless gloves were fine, he was pretty sure no one would have a problem with those. That left him in a grey, short-sleeved shirt and black jeans with his gloves and socks as he wandered back into the rest of the house.

Lance was waiting by the entrance to the kitchen, ready to lead Keith in and begin the introductions. He wrapped his arm around Keith’s neck again and swiftly pulled him over in front of Lance’s family. Keith stumbled a bit but quickly regained his balance, staring out at everyone nervously.

“Alright! That over there is _mi mamá,”_ he pointed to a shorter woman who was hovering near the kitchen with a wooden spoon in her hand. She waved it when she was introduced.

 _“Hola,_ Keith! It’s so nice to meet you! Please, call me Esmeralda,” she smiled warmly.

Lance quickly pointed to a man who was standing near the back of the living room. He had a smile on his face and Keith couldn’t help but notice the resemblance him and Lance shared. “That’s _mi papá.”_

“Alejandro,” Lance’s father corrected. “We’re all very glad you could make it to dinner.” He had a quieter demeanor about him which Keith could appreciate.

“That’s my older sister, Valeria.” An older woman, who couldn’t have been much older than Keith himself, waved enthusiastically at the mention of her name from her seat on the armrest of the couch. “That’s my younger sister, Noelia.” The girl who had been red in the face at the door met Keith’s eye briefly before staring anywhere else again. She seemed to be hiding herself in the couch. “And, the youngest, Diego,”

“Youngest just means favourite,” he defended, a triumphant smile on his face. He was just as energetic as Lance, Keith could tell.

Lance scoffed, “Youngest means ‘the reason we stopped having kids.’” Diego tried to swat at Lance but Lance just side stepped the attack. “Anyway, this is Keith! He’s my– Well, I guess he’s going to be my roommate soon! He lives in a plant shop he owns and runs, he drives a motorbike, he’s a grumpy hermit, and he believes in aliens!”

“Hey!” Keith protested. That had got to be the worst introduction he had ever heard in his life. He wasn’t a hermit… His family and friends all thought he was, but he wasn’t.

“What? It’s all true! You can’t even argue with me, Keith, you would spend all your time with your plants and your alien theories if I didn’t drag you out of that shack constantly!”

Keith sputtered indignantly, “Shack?! Never mind, I retract my rooming offer, you can live in a box on the street.” He huffed, irritated, and turned to glare off at a far-off place in Lance’s house. It was at that moment when he realized that everyone had been watching them the entire time with expressions of varying amusement.

Lance gasped, “That’s the rudest thing anyone has ever said to me!” He turned back to his family, “Can you believe this guy?”

“I’d make you live in a box too,” Diego countered, leveling an unimpressed look at Lance. Then he bounced up to Keith, offering his hand. Keith, making the mistake of awkwardly grabbing it, was immediately jerked away from Lance’s arm and further into the living room. “Aliens are out there, obviously, Lance is just lame and doesn’t want to see the truth,” he opened. Keith guessed that the boy couldn’t have been more than thirteen and yet he already found himself relating to Diego on a deep level.

“I know, that’s why he’s always losing debates,” Keith snorted. Diego seemed to find this amusing even though Lance could be heard squawking in the background.

“The looks of a stereotypical bad boy with the heart of a plant nerd and the mind of a conspiracy theorist?” Valeria laughed. She made her way over to shake Keith’s hand, which he did as best he could while Diego was still latched onto him. He seemed to like attaching himself to Keith for reasons that weren’t explained. She turned to Lance then, still holding Keith’s hand, “I like him, can we keep him?”

Lance swatted her hands away from Keith’s. “You weren’t invited over here so you could adopt my friends,” he reminded, as though this was a common problem.

“You just want him all to yourself,” she pouted.

Face turning red, Lance released a series of irate noises, none of which were in an actual language. “What’s that supposed to mean?!” he demanded, gesturing wildly with his arms like he did when he was frustrated or upset.

“Relax, I’m not trying to steal your boyfriend,” she soothed.

Keith could feel as his face pulled down into a frown. Lance yelped, “He’s not my boyfriend!”

Valeria looked genuinely surprised at that. In fact, everyone did. Noelia was wide-eyed on the couch, the blush on her face seemingly gone once again. Diego scrunched up his face in confusion. Alejandro glanced between Lance and Keith as though he were trying to uncover some sort of secret. Esmeralda stopped what she was doing in the kitchen to glance over at them with an eyebrow raised.

“Are you sure?” Valeria finally asked, sounding as though she thought it was a joke.

“Yeah, because literally no one was getting friend vibes,” Diego interjected, staring up at Lance, not believing a word he said.

Lance defensively shrugged his shoulders. “You’re seeing things that aren’t there then, because we’re friends!”

Keith was about to clarify that he wasn’t interested, that he and Lance were to remain friends, but he kept his mouth shut. He could feel the words on the tip of his tongue, but something about the words tasted weirder than usual, almost bitter and wrong. But they weren’t wrong. Keith wouldn’t ever date anyone, he knew he’d mess it up, he knew he’d hurt his partner accidentally, even if he didn’t mean to. Surely, if his father had raised Keith as a cheater, Keith was bound to be one too. It was just easier not to date and risk it.

So, Keith wasn’t going to ruin everything by dating someone, especially Lance. He didn’t even want to date Lance. Those words felt strange to even think, but they were true. Weren’t they? They had to be.

Keith hadn’t even noticed that he had zoned out until Lance was calling his name. “Keith? You still with us? Did you fall asleep at the wheel?” Lance’s face was much closer to Keith’s than it had been moments ago.

For a split second, time seemed to slow for a moment. A sudden rush of emotions flooded Keith as he stared into Lance’s unbearably blue eyes, emotions that he couldn’t place, emotions that he hadn’t ever felt before. Lance’s eyes seemed to swallow him like an ocean as he stared into them. Then, just as quickly as it had happened, time rushed back to Keith and he realized he had been staring for a second too long.

“Yeah, sorry…” he muttered, hoping his face wasn’t as red as he felt like it might be.

“It’s fine. You just completely left reality for a moment,” Lance chuckled. There was still a light blush along Lance’s cheeks, alluding to the conversation that Keith had just zoned out on.

Diego was suddenly yelling into the kitchen to his mother, _“¿Mamá?_ When are we going to eat?”

“Thirty minutes,” Esmeralda called back. “Alejandro, could you come help?” Lance’s father instantly left the room to go help her, offering Keith a pleasant smile as a goodbye before he was gone. He lived up to Keith’s opinion that he was a fairly quiet man.

“We have time!” Diego exclaimed, then he was grabbing onto Keith’s hand again – what was it with grabbing onto Keith’s hands? – and tugged him over to the couch. He bounced down onto it and picked up a handheld gaming console that had been on the cushion next to him. “Keith, come look! I almost have enough Quintessence points to upgrade my Green Lion!” Keith had absolutely no idea what he was talking about and no idea how to entertain a kid, but he sat down on the couch in between Diego and Noelia.

“Upgrade the Green Lion?” Keith repeated.

Diego scooted over a little bit to allow Keith a view of the screen. There were five animated lions of different ridiculous colours fighting in an arena against some other strangely coloured animals. The lions seemed to be winning as the opponents all had much lower health. Keith hadn’t played a lot of video games as a kid but, from what he saw, it appeared to be extremely close to Pokémon or some other attack-based game.

Diego prattled on about the logistics of the game; how to play, what each bar meant, what his lions’ special abilities were, how you win battles, what you can do with your winnings. Keith tried his best to listen and to follow along, but there was just so much to remember and it really wasn’t Keith’s thing to begin with. Still, he asked questions and nodded along, hoping that he was doing his best to seem enthralled. The angry expression on his face probably wasn’t helping his case but he couldn’t help it.

As Diego continued to play, Keith subtly glanced around the room and found that Lance and Valeria were on the other side, talking about something. It must’ve been quite the conversation since Lance was doing his wild arm gesturing thing. Keith noticed that Valeria did it too. He smiled to himself. Meeting new people wasn’t that bad, Lance’s family, for example, were all people Keith wouldn’t mind getting to know.

Keith couldn’t help but be grateful to Lance for barging his way into Keith’s life, drunk and lost, because Keith’s life hadn’t been the same since that moment.


	11. I'm Lichen Where This Is Going

Diego decided that his lion game wasn’t fun enough since Keith could only watch and not play, so he ran off to go find another game somewhere else in the house. Keith had just been relaxing on the couch next to Lance and Valeria, listening to them chat about life, including Keith every now and again.

It was then that he got a sudden tap on his shoulder which swiftly pulled him out of the conversation and drew his attention to the nervous looking Noelia standing behind him. At some point, she had gotten up to leave without saying a word, but she returned, this time with a small houseplant in her hands. Keith found it a little strange that she was so silent considering he was pretty sure that she had been the one on the other end of the phone when Lance called, the same one who was giving him heck. But, maybe she just didn’t like strangers. Keith could respect that, he was the same way, especially when he was in his late teens like she was.

“Uh…” she began. The blush was back on her cheeks as usual and Keith was beginning to wonder if it was a medical condition or not. “You’re good with flowers… right…?” she asked timidly.

“Yeah,” Keith answered.

She thrust the plant at him and he nearly dropped it in his attempt to grab it. He stared down at the orchid before looking back up at her, not sure what she wanted. By this point, Lance and Valeria had finished whatever they were talking about and were watching on, amused grins on their faces. “My flower keeps dying and I don’t know why. I keep watering it but it doesn’t do anything,” she explained, shuffling her feet.

Keith instantly switched over into his Marmora Garden Shop employee persona. Inspecting the plant, he couldn’t find anything that could allude to a physical problem. He furrowed his eyebrows and checked the pot, not finding anything wrong with it either. The soil was all wrong though, that was probably part of the reason it was dying. He stopped what he was doing with the plant to stick his face up, feeling the air around the house. Not very humid, rather dry actually.

“Do you keep it at the window?” he asked.

“Yeah,” she replied. Slowly, she settled herself onto the couch next to him, never taking her eyes off of him. It was slightly unnerving, but Keith was too busy saving a plant to care.

“Does your window get a lot of light? Moth orchids like a lot of light,” he explained. He stuck his fingers into the pot soil, finding that it was sopping wet. Pulling them out with a grim face, he turned back to Noelia.

She looked contemplative as she answered, “Yeah, my window gets lots of light.” If Keith didn’t know any better, he’d say that she had moved closer.

“Okay, well, I think the problem is the soil. Pot mix doesn’t work very nicely with orchids, especially moth orchids. You should get something like an orchid bark or a sphagnum moss, because the roots of your plant are probably rotting. Also, watering the plant more isn’t helping it, in fact, it’s probably helping it rot. In winter and fall you shouldn’t water it as much as you would in the summer and spring. Your house isn’t very humid either, which it should be, orchids like that. You could just get a humidifier for your room or spray a water spritzer over the plant every now and again. Not directly on the plant, but over it so that the water falls onto it. This plant might be too late to save, but you could give it a shot, it might survive,” Keith concluded. He looked over at Noelia to find that she was staring at him, wide-eyed and enraptured.

“Wow, you sure know a lot about plants,” she commented.

Keith nodded, handing her flower back, “Yup.”

She held her plant gently, glancing at it briefly before staring back up at Keith. “Where’d you learn all that?” she asked, smiling sweetly.

“Some in college, some from my parents,” he answered.

“You went to college to learn about plants? I think that’s really cool! I think plants are cool.” She glanced away, a nervous laugh in her voice. “What did you say this flower was called?”

Keith studied the yellow plant, if only to stop making horribly awkward eye contact with the girl. “Dragon’s gold moth orchid,” he replied. He quickly turned around to face Lance, who was on his left, before Noelia could ask anything else. “Hey, you didn’t tell me, what’re we having for dinner?”

Valeria answered with a smile, “Oh, yeah! We’re having pulled pork.”

“I haven’t had pulled pork in so long, I might die,” Lance whined, all but drooling over the thought of it. Keith liked the thought of it too. He didn’t get a whole lot of good, healthy meals since he lived alone and couldn’t cook to save his life. Lance seemed to be able to cook though, which was one of the things Keith was looking forward to when he moved in with Lance.

 _“¡La cena está lista! ¡Ven a comer!”_ Esmeralda shouted from the kitchen.

Lance just about launched himself out of his seat with a screech. He grabbed Keith’s hand and yanked him to his feet. “Keith! It’s time to eat!” he cheered, bouncing on his feet as he led Keith off to the kitchen. Keith smiled along with him unconsciously as he followed along to the dining room with him. Valeria sprinted past Lance and Keith, hollering as she did. Noelia hurried along next to Keith with a smile on her face. There was a thunder of footsteps as Diego raced down the stairs, also hollering.

When everyone sat down at the dinner table to eat, Lance attentively made room for Keith in the seat beside him. He explained what everything was, what it was made from, how his mother made the best meals and Keith was about to be blown away by how incredible it was.

Esmeralda invited Keith to have as much as he wanted with a warm smile which reminded Keith of his own mother. She also called him skin and bones, which Keith couldn’t even argue with since he had been more than willing to eat a meat and cheese stick from the gas station as dinner not too long ago. This must be where Lance got his food habits from considering he had been ready to fight Keith on his dinner choice that night. Esmeralda was an extremely kind woman, Keith came to quickly discover, especially when Keith kindly thanked her for the meal and she had told him it was the least she could do since he was giving her son a place to live, no questions asked.

Alejandro seemed to agree, even going on to say that Keith had a kind heart and a good soul, whatever that meant. He deemed Keith as an honorary member of the Sanchez family. Anytime that Keith wanted to come over just to get away from Lance, he was welcome over at their house. Keith couldn’t help but laugh along with everyone at that one, everyone except Lance, of course, who protested that he was a delight and Keith’s life was about to be made better when he moved in.

Valeria told many stories about how her life was going, the new job promotion she had gotten. She worked as a journalist, which Keith thought was actually a pretty cool job, and probably appropriate for Valeria as she seemed a little bit nosy. Although she wasn’t allowed to leak any of the news stories that were going to be released in the upcoming week, she was able to talk about projects that she was hoping to work on soon.

Diego went on about his games. Keith still wasn’t sure what he was talking about, but he made sure to pay extra attention because it was clear that he was really only bringing the subject up to tell Keith about it. He also rambled on about school and how that was going, what classes he was enjoying and what classes he wasn’t enjoying. He was in sixth grade, which he was actually quite boastful about, stating that he wasn’t in elementary school anymore, he was in middle school.

Noelia didn’t have a whole lot to say, but she did do a lot of staring. At Keith. It was uncomfortable and every time Keith would make eye contact with her, she would immediately turn away, her face heating up. Lance did eventually notice this all happening. He laughed mischievously at her and asked why she was being so quiet, which had her glaring at him. Keith was beginning to wonder if there was something that he was missing because Valeria looked at Noelia, then at Keith, then at Noelia again, all before oohing teasingly. Yeah, something was definitely going right over Keith’s head there.

The rest of dinner was very nice and friendly. Keith hadn’t had a lot of dinners like that in his life. His family used to sit around the table together, happy and whole, chatting about their days just like this, but that was quite awhile ago. Now, most of the dinners Keith could remember were spent in silence with him sitting on the floor by the couch, Acxa sat on the couch, Shiro eating his food at the table, and their mother eating at the island in the kitchen, if she was even there at all. And their father was hardly ever there at all. None of them ever spoke to each other either, they just sat and watched the television. So, this sort of thing was a nice change for Keith, a refreshing breath of nostalgia for a time when his family was happy together.

Keith found himself smiling and laughing a lot more recently. Not just with Lance’s family, but ever since he had met Lance in general. His life was just fine before, but Lance had done a lot to change Keith in such a short time. Keith was feeling a lot of things that he never thought he’d feel again, and a lot of things he’d just never felt before. It was definitely a lively couple of months, that was for sure. Keith wasn’t sure it was a good thing, but it definitely wasn’t a bad thing either. He wasn’t sure what sort of things they would get up to once they were living together, but he was also intrigued to find out.

After dinner, Keith offered to help clean up since he still felt like he was intruding on some level, but Esmeralda didn’t let him, shooing him away. He played a few more games with Diego, talked some more with Noelia about plants, and listened to Valeria prattle on. At one point or another, Valeria brought up an alien theory. Clearly, she had no idea what she was talking about. Keith had to get in on that, bringing up his evidence. Diego quickly backed him up and Noelia just nodded in agreement. Lance laughed, siding with Valeria.

“Keith, aliens did not visit ancient people in Africa! That literally makes no sense!” Lance would argue.

“Then explain how they knew about planets that took modern humans a lot of time and effort to find since they _can’t even be seen without extremely advanced telescopes!”_ Keith would counter.

Valeria would scoff, “There are planets everywhere, they probably guessed, or people are seeing connections that aren’t there.”

“Weak! Lame excuse!” Diego would boo. “You don’t even have real evidence!”

“Is that really the best case you can present?” Noelia would ask with a pitying stare.

It all went by so fast that Keith hadn’t even noticed how much time had gone by. It was already 11:00 when Diego began to get tired and Lance decided that they should probably stop overstaying their welcome. Keith gave quick goodbyes to everyone, receiving heartfelt statements from everyone about how great it was that he was able to come over for dinner and how they’d hoped he’d come again.

Lance stayed behind to chat with his family a bit more, so while he did that, Keith slipped outside with his helmet for a cigarette. He leaned against the porch railing and heaved a smoke-filled sigh into the winter air. His mind trailed back through the evening, spreading a warmth inside of him at the idea of Lance and his family. Something about the fact that Lance wanted to introduce him to his family made Keith’s spine tingle. He wanted to introduce Lance to his family too. Picturing someone as aggressive as Acxa meeting someone as upbeat and excitable as Lance was an amusing image. Keith smiled around the cigarette in his mouth.

“You don’t look like you smoke,” a voice behind him commented.

Keith turned, meeting Valeria’s curious gaze from where she was heading out of the doorway. He removed the cigarette from his mouth and puffed some smoke into the air. “I can move down the driveway if it bothers you,” he offered. People who pointed out his smoking often didn’t like it, he had found.

“No, no, I just…” she paused, squinting at Keith as though she were trying to determine something. “You’re really not Lance’s boyfriend?”

Keith huffed a laugh, although it held no humour, “No, I’m really not.” Turning around to fully face her, Keith rested his back against the railing and replaced the cigarette back in his mouth.

She continued to stare at him with her hands deep inside her coat pockets. Sighing, she said, “It’s just that Lance hardly ever brings anyone home, and it has been awhile since the last time.”

Keith didn’t know what to say. He glanced to the door behind Valeria, hoping that Lance would hurry the heck up.

Valeria continued, taking Keith’s pause as an opportunity, “He’s changed a lot. I haven’t seen him smile like that in awhile, so whatever you’re doing, it seems to be working. Whatever you are to him, and whatever he is to you, just please take care of him.” There was a look of genuine concern and sincere hope on her face, as though she were now entrusting the life of her brother into Keith’s hands.

After a moment where Keith just stared at Valeria, taking in her features and truly understanding what she was asking of him, how much she was asking of him, he finally nodded, “I’ll do my best…” It was a shaky and unsure whisper, but it made Valeria’s face break out into a relieved grin.

“Thank you!” She was once again back to the loud and playful lady that Keith had witnessed inside the house. Her face was built for happiness, Keith concluded. He had only met her this one time, but he found himself not wanting to see her, or any of the other members of Lance’s family anything up happy ever again. It was amazing how protective Keith had become of this group of people from only one dinner, but it was even more amazing how protective he felt of Lance himself.

Valeria skipped down the steps and along the driveway until she reached her car. As she left, she called back over her shoulder, “Have a nice night, Keith!” Then she unlocked her car door and slipped inside. Keith waved to her as she drove away, still finishing his cigarette on the porch.

“Keith! Let’s get this show on the road! I can hear my bed calling to me from all the way over here,” Lance exclaimed, leaping out of the house with his borrowed helmet halfway on his head already.

Keith quickly put out the rest of his cigarette and shoved the rest of it back into the box before turning to Lance. The guy couldn’t even get his helmet strap on properly, what a dolt. Keith smiled softly, “You’re too hyper for your bed to be calling you.” He clipped Lance’s helmet on.

Lance laughed, “No, no, Keith, it is, listen.” He raised his voice’s pitch, imitating what a bed sounded like in his mind, _“’Lance! Lance, come back! I miss you! If you’re trying to make me jealous with Keith’s couch, it’s working!”_

Throwing his head back, Keith let out a sudden guffaw. He hadn’t been expecting that at all but it was funny. When he calmed himself down to smaller giggles, he glanced over at Lance, who had just been standing there, smiling at him with a fond expression the entire time. Keith met his eye for a second too long, until he could feel that unidentifiable feeling rising up within him and he forced himself to turn away before it bubbled over.

“We should get you back to your bed then,” Keith agreed, grabbing his helmet off the porch railing and popping it on his head.

He was certain that the feeling that scratched at the back of his brain, speeding his heart up and setting his nerves on fire, would be gone by the time he got to his bike. But it wasn’t. The feeling remained the entire time he walked to his bike, it was there as he drove, it was there as he dropped Lance off, it remained as he parked his bike, and even as Keith stumbled into bed, he still couldn’t shake it.

The worst part of the feeling was that it wasn’t even a bad one. As he closed his eyes for the night, all he could see on the back of his eyelids was image of Lance’s excited smile and bright eyes. He drifted off into a calming and gentle sleep with that picture in the forefront of his mind. It was one of the best sleeps Keith had ever had.

 

◊ ◊ ◊

 

Lance flopped down on his bed, tired and worn out. He had had a great day, even if his house was being upended, forcing him to move. It wasn’t that he was going to struggle finding somewhere to live for the next month or anything, he had somewhere to go. That was where the problem was though. He was going to be living with Keith.

Before, when Lance had realized just what that meant, he had been excited, but after introducing Keith to his family, he decided that it wasn’t an exciting new development in their relationship or a chance to get closer to the guy he liked, it was going to be painful. Sure, he would get to wake up every morning to see Keith, but there wouldn’t be more. What happened when Keith found someone who he liked enough to face his fear of relationships for. Would Lance have to just accept that? Would he be able to accept that? Would he be able to handle the heartbreak of coming home to see Keith making out with someone on the couch, or have Keith blow him off because he had plans for a date, or have to listen to Keith go on about someone who he loved more than he would ever be able to love Lance?

Lance wanted to say that he could, wanted to believe that being happy for Keith wouldn’t be difficult at all, wanted to convince himself that if he really loved Keith, he wouldn’t even have to ask that question, but the truth was that Lance wouldn’t be fine. He knew it wasn’t the same, but he was beginning to feel like he had set himself up for a repeat of the Nyma situation. It wasn’t like that though, he knew that. Keith would never hurt him the way Nyma had, but he could still feel the old wound reopening itself.

Keith wasn’t like Nyma though, not in any way. Nyma was perfect, too good to be true, and always very static in how she behaved. Keith was brash and moody, he was standoffish and grumbly, he was quick to anger and held grudges, his words packed just as much of a punch as his fists did, but he never used either of them without reason. Keith wasn’t perfect and he wasn’t too good to be true, he was a mess and he was too insane to be real. Yet, that was what Lance loved about Keith, he was human. Something about Nyma felt alien, especially when Lance looked back on it, but Keith never felt that way, he was too upfront on his feelings to be that way. Keith wasn’t perfect-perfect, but he was perfect to Lance. And maybe that was why Lance could make out with as many random strangers as he wanted, but he would never be able to run from his feelings forever.

Maybe if Lance were a girl he would have a shot…? Maybe if he wasn’t so loud or pushy? Maybe if Lance wasn’t so energetic and excitable, and he knew more about plants, and he didn’t always go out and get himself into dangerous situations that he couldn’t get out of, and he wasn’t so open with his flirting, and he didn’t just offer to make out with anyone, and he wasn’t so nosy about personal issues, and he didn’t make such stupid jokes, and believed in aliens, and was more sensitive about things, and had a better paying job, and he had something unique about himself that would set him apart from the rest. Maybe then Keith might look at him in a romantic light.

A quiet, subdued, calm, sensible, sensitive, hard-working, intelligent, talented, hard to get, alien hunting girl who had a tasteful sense of humour and a passion for plants. So… not Lance…

God, he hoped that that wasn’t what Keith was looking for. What was Keith’s type? Did Keith have a type? Would Keith be at all willing to give someone a shot, even if they were his type?

Lance sighed, completely worn out from all the depressing thinking he had just gone through. Rolling over, he decided that he had had enough, and he finally gave in to the fatigue that plagued him just as his eyes began to well up. He was unconscious before the first tear even made it to his pillow case.


	12. Pack My Trunk and Leaf

Marmora Garden Shop was, thankfully, at the end of the street. This was a good thing considering how much stuff Lance had to bring over to Keith’s apartment. It was also extremely convenient that they lived right across from each other since Lance didn’t own a vehicle, Keith only had his bike, and neither of them could afford the moving van needed to lug Lance’s things. So, Lance emptied his house and piled his stuff in the street, and Keith came out to bring all the boxes inside.

It had been a rough round of Rock Paper Scissors to decide whose couch, coffee table, and all other furniture that couldn’t fit in the apartment they would use. In the end, neither wanted to give their stuff up, so Lance’s furniture was put under Keith’s smoking corner in the shop and made into a mini sitting area for customers. Lance actually really liked the idea.

Keith actually didn’t own a lot of things, unlike Lance, plus his apartment was much bigger than Lance’s, so everything else actually fit perfectly. It was small and cozy, but it wasn’t cramped and suffocating. It felt homey and domestic, especially when Lance glanced around at all the things that belonged to him intermingled amongst the things that belonged to Keith. He liked it, but it still stung knowing that it wouldn’t mean anything to Keith.

Keith was in the process of helping Lance carry a bookshelf across the street when Lance released a heavy sigh and set his end on the asphalt.

“What’re you doing?” Keith frowned, still holding his half off the ground.

“Taking a break,” Lance decided. He wandered over to the heap of snow at the end of the road where the snow plow had dropped it off. It was so tightly compacted that it wouldn't melt for awhile, even if the rest of the snow was already gone. In fact, it was already so warm out that Keith was just in a sweatshirt while Lance wore a t-shirt with a light hoodie on overtop. Lance dropped back onto the snow, not caring if his hoodie got wet.

“Lance, we’re in the middle of the road!” Keith pointed out, disbelief in his voice.

Lance rolled his head over, feeling the cold snow press against his cheek as he stared at Keith. “We’ve been working hard, we deserve a break,” he reasoned.

Keith rolled his eyes. “We could have a break in the house if you just helped me move this shelf the rest of the way.”

It took Lance a lot of effort not to grin dopily when Keith referred to the house as ‘the’ house. As in, the only house. There wasn’t a ‘my house’ or a ‘your house,’ it was ‘our house.’ ‘The house.’ Lance reigned himself in enough to declare from his makeshift snow bed, “We could, but it’s so far away and the weather is so nice!” He reached his hands up into the air, feeling the crisp breeze through his fingertips.

“You’re sitting in a pile of snow,” Keith pointed out, setting the other half of the shelf on the ground.

“You could be too if you came over here,” Lance hinted. He brought his arms back down to push himself into a seated position. The snow seeped through his pants, but Lance didn’t care. He raised an eyebrow at Keith playfully.

Keith just glared back, although it held no real heat. “Oddly enough, I don’t want my ass to be wet for the next three days. Denim doesn’t dry easy, Lance,” he replied sarcastically, crossing his arms and jutting a hit out in some form of defiance.

Lance smiled evilly, biting his lip as he pushed himself the rest of the way out of the Lance-shaped dent he had made in the snow. “Come on,” he muttered, sauntering closer to Keith.

“No,” Keith told him.

“Keith,” Lance singsonged, still moving closer. “Come on…”

Keith’s eyebrows raised and he held his hands out toward Lance, warning him again, “Lance, stop it.” Lance didn’t listen, he just grabbed onto Keith’s hands and tugged him forward. Keith yelped, tumbling and tripping after Lance as he pulled them along. “Lance, Lance, no, _Lance!”_ Keith frantically protested. They were getting closer to the snow pile. Keith braced right as the backs of Lance’s knees hit the snow and he dropped backwards, landing in the snow pile with Keith ending up right next to him, making his very own Keith-shaped dent.

Lance laughed, shuffling around to face Keith with his smug smile. “Now you’re sitting in a pile of snow too,” he teased.

Keith huffed his bangs out of his face and glared at Lance. “You’re a dick and you don’t get to live here anymore,” he deadpanned.

“Aw, Keith,” Lance faux-pouted. “What if I agreed that, on top of helping you with your plants sometimes, I also make breakfast and lunch every morning?” Lance offered, tilting his head innocently, or trying to since he was lying down.

Keith’s irritated expression cleared, leaving behind genuine surprise and disbelief. “You’d do that?”

Lance hummed, “Yeah, of course. Besides, I know you don’t eat any real meals, and it’s going to start catching up to you. I’m just trying to make sure you don’t have a heart attack at age thirty.” That wasn’t the truth. Lance just worried about Keith’s health and wanted to take care of him in a way that made it feel like maybe they were something more than friends and roommates. Lance was not about to tell Keith that though, because that would get Lance a one-way ticket back onto the street, never to see Keith again.

Keith clicked his tongue and rolled his head back to stare at the sky again. “Don’t worry, the cigarettes will do that for me,” Keith mumbled. Then he sat up on his elbows and shimmied his way out of the pile of snow. Lance watched as Keith brushed the snow off his clothes. He stood there for a moment, leveling a glare at the shelf, then he turned back to Lance. “Come on, get up. You wanted a break, I’ll make us some hot chocolate,” Keith offered, holding his gloved hand out to Lance.

The proposal lit Lance’s heart on fire, but he didn’t take it right away. Eyeing Keith up and down suspiciously, he raised an eyebrow and asked, “With five marshmallows?”

“If that’s how you like it,” Keith agreed, wiggling his fingers a little bit to entice Lance.

“Deal!” Lance cheered. He smacked his hand into the black leather covering Keith’s hand and grabbed on. With a grunt, he pulled himself up to stand next to Keith. “What about my shelf? I don’t want to carry it in,” Lance whined.

“Leave it,” Keith said, swatting a dismissive hand at the wooden shelf as he wandered by it. “Hopefully someone will steal the stupid thing so there’s less work for us.”

Lance stared at Keith in offense. “I hope someone comes by and leaves an extra shelf so there’s more work, just because you said that.”

Keith turned back to Lance with a weary look as they reached the door. “You couldn’t even manage one shelf, do you really want to carry another shelf?” he asked, knowing the answer. Keith opened the door to the garden shop and held it for Lance.

“No, you’re right, I don’t…” Lance conceded. Keith snorted in response as the pair made their way up the stairs of their new shared apartment, damp and tired, leaving Lance’s shelf in the middle of the street to probably be forgotten about until hours later.

 

◊ ◊ ◊

 

The day wasn’t a dull one by any stretch of the imagination, but Keith knew it wouldn’t be. Seasons were switching and the snow was melting, which could only mean one thing; gardening season. Keith’s favourite time of year was gardening season, partially because it meant that he could go outside and see all the beautiful plants, partially because he could finally plant more outdoor plants, and partially because the business to his shop increased drastically once people were actually able to go out and garden. He did run a gardening shop, after all.

So, Keith spent the entire day helping people out where it was needed and recommending plants and products to all kinds of people; people who wanted indoor plants, who wanted outdoor plants, who’d never planted anything before in their lives, who came around every year, who wanted trees, who wanted bushes, who wanted blooms, everything under the sun, and even some plants that weren’t under the sun.

Regular customers always raved about Keith’s shop and how well taken care of the plants were. Many new customers did too and were extremely surprised to find that Keith ran the place himself. But what Keith wasn’t betting on, was how much everyone would love the new setup with Lance’s furniture. Sure, a place to sit amongst the plants was ideal, Keith had his own stool for just that reason, but he didn’t think everyone would love to sit amongst his flowers as much as he did. Who knew that a simple case of too much furniture would turn into a selling point for his shop.

Around lunch time, things started to slow down a bit. Keith was thankful for the break, especially since he knew that the place would be packed again once everyone had eaten. Some people liked to do their shopping in the afternoon instead of the morning. Not that Keith was complaining; he liked to shop in the middle of the night.

It was a strange thing this day though. Keith could count on one hand the amount of times he had eaten a full meal at lunch time while he was working, mostly because he snacked throughout the day as an alternative to keep him going. Sometimes he just straight up drank a boatload of coffee, but that was only on days when he hadn’t gone shopping for groceries in awhile and was running low. This day, however, Keith could actually feel his stomach rumbling with hunger, and he knew why. He hadn’t been snacking through the day like usual due to the fact that, true to his word, Lance had made Keith lunch.

Keith was flattered by the offer of breakfast and lunch every day, curtesy of Lance, but he wasn’t expecting it to change anything. It had. It had changed something. Keith didn’t snack anymore, he couldn’t even bring himself to because Lance’s breakfasts were so hearty that they lasted Keith well into lunch, and even when they didn’t, the thought of spoiling Lance’s lunches by snacking was just blasphemy at this point. Lance was a cooking genius, but Keith supposed he had to be since he lived in a large family and he had also mentioned one of his best friends, Hunk, was a culinary artist and had taught him everything he knew.

So, the decrease in customers around lunch time was a blessing, not only because it meant that Keith didn’t have to talk to anymore people, but it also signalled that he had an opening to eat his lunch.

Keith glanced around his shop, seeing only a couple people here or there, none of which required his help. He quickly reached under the counter to pull out a Tupperware container and a fork wrapped in saranwrap. Thanks to Lance’s new lunches, Keith had even cleared a spot in the shelving of his desk to store the lunch. Before, everything was just sort of covered in a thin layer of dirt.

Setting up the container on the counter, he popped the lid off and unwrapped his fork with lightening speed. The second the aroma hit him, Keith practically melted. The pristine fusilli noodles lay interspersed amongst the cooked broccoli bits, mixed together with a light cream of broccoli sauce, all topped off with bread crumbs and seasoning blend. If it tasted even half as good as it looked, Keith would probably start crying. He had such a weak spot for pasta. It was such a simple dish, yet Keith couldn’t help but think that Lance really did spoil him.

Before he could plunge his fork into the beautiful lunch awaiting him, a voice brought him out of his delicious transfixion, “Do my eyes deceive me? Is that Keith Kogane eating a real lunch?”

Keith turned his attention to the pair approaching his desk, Pidge and Allura. “Hey, guys,” Keith greeted. Normally he would meet Pidge’s taunt with a sarcastic comment of his own, but not this time, not when he had such a great lunch to eat. “Come here to make fun of me in my own home?” he raised an eyebrow, his fork still hovering over his food.

“No, we came here to buy a plant for Allura’s uncle,” Pidge said, nodding her head toward Allura.

“It’s his birthday soon,” Allura smiled.

Pidge nodded in agreement, “We just didn’t think we’d come here to find you actually eating properly for once. Seriously, did you learn to cook overnight?” She leaned over the counter to peer into the container.

“Lance made it for me,” Keith answered proudly. He scooped some of the pasta and broccoli onto his fork, shoving it into his mouth before either of them could ask him another question. A whine escaped him as the flavour hit his tongue. He could melt into a puddle of goo right where he was, it was so good.

Pidge and Allura exchanged a look, which Keith didn’t see since he was so focused on not crying into his pasta.

“Lance? As in, the one who was really friendly?” Allura clarified.

“Yeah,” Keith muttered in between bites.

Pidge furrowed her eyebrows, “Weren’t you complaining about him?”

Keith’s eyes softened as he stared down at the food again. “Yeah, I was,” he admitted.

“Okay…” Pidge drew out the word.

“He makes you lunch now?” Allura prodded, finding this as equally weird as Pidge was, although Keith was too busy with his pasta and broccoli mixed with thoughts of Lance’s excited grin to really notice.

Keith hummed around another forkful. He swallowed, then stared off into the distance at his plants, starry-eyed. “And breakfast. Sometimes dinner,” he confessed.

Pidge and Allura’s expressions just became more confused. Stepping forward, Pidge rested her elbows on the desk and stared closer at Keith. “Did he poison it? Or is he blackmailing you?” she interrogated.

Keith frowned, pausing his chewing to stare at her as if she had grown another head, “No, what the fuck?”

“Then why is he making you meals?” Allura questioned, taking her own time to investigate the fusilli.

“Yeah,” Pidge acquiesced, “and why are you eating it with a dopey grin on your face?” She jammed a finger into Keith’s cheek, causing him to startle backwards, nearly dropping his fork.

Keith hadn’t thought he was making any particular face, but upon being called out, he could feel his cheeks heat up a bit. “I’m smiling because it’s good,” he defended, glaring hard at Pidge. “And he makes me lunch because I pay our utility bills,” Keith mumbled, shifting his food into one of the corners so it was easier to pick up.

“Whoa, hold on!” Pidge exclaimed. “Are you saying that he moved in with you?!” Her eyebrows couldn’t possibly raise any higher up her face. Even Allura was wide-eyed with surprise, not expecting that twist at all.

“Yeah, last week. I just forgot to mention it, but I didn’t really think it was impor–”

Pidge cut him off, “You didn’t think it was important to mention that the guy you feared was stalking you is now living with you?!”

“Keith, are you feeling alright?” Allura asked, real concern in her eyes.

Keith rolled his eyes, “I’m fine! I just… I was wrong about Lance, he’s actually a really good person.” He took another bite, practically moaning at the taste, “And he’s a really good cook. God, he’s kind of amazing…”

“Wow…” Pidge breathed, taking a step away from the counter to just stare at Keith.

“What?” Keith frowned.

Pidge ignored him, turning to Allura, “Is it just me or…?”

Allura rapidly shook her head, the same look of disbelief on her face. “No, it’s definitely not just you,” she answered before Pidge even finished her question.

“What’re you talking about?” Keith demanded, getting a little bit irritated.

Allura and Pidge stared him down once again, not answering. Then slowly, Pidge leaned toward Allura, who leaned down a bit, neither taking their eyes off Keith. “He doesn’t even hear himself…” she whispered, as though Keith couldn’t hear and see her right there. Allura agreed though.

Keith threw his arms up and groaned, exasperated. Then he scooped the rest of the fusilli into his mouth until his cheeks were full. He chewed quickly, leaving his Tupperware on the counter as he headed back towards the shelf where the flowers he had in mind for a gift were. Swallowing the rest of his lunch, he glanced over his shoulder, getting right down to business so that they couldn’t be weird about Lance anymore. “Coran would probably like a poinsettia, amaryllis, or a cyclamen. Poinsettias and amaryllises come in orange, which you mentioned he likes, but cyclamen doesn’t. I’d also have to order the orange amaryllis if that’s what you decided on.”

Luckily, the two of them seemed to come out of their stupor regarding Lance and decided to follow along with Keith’s advice. Allura studied all the plants that Keith pointed out, eventually deciding that the orange poinsettia would be the best choice. Keith told her all the details of looking after the plant, gave her a pamphlet, and sold her some supplies, along with some other materials that Pidge had picked out for her plant, Rover. She took the opportunity to inform Keith that Rover was flourishing, no longer covered in any form of mildew. They left after that, quickly making plans to hang out some time soon at a place that wasn’t where one of the three worked.

So, all in all, aside from the strange attitude of Allura and Pidge, Keith had had a pretty good work day. He found himself wondering if Lance had a good day too. Now that Keith thought about it, he realized that he really didn’t have to sit around and wait for Lance to come home if he didn’t want to. It wouldn’t be completely weird to go pick Lance up. He didn’t work too far away, so walking there wasn’t an issue. The Blue Spring Diner was right across from the gas station and Keith needed cigarettes anyways, plus Lance always forgot his key to the house, why would this time be different? Why not, right?

Keith checked the clock. He would close up the shop half an hour earlier. That would give him just enough time to buy more cigs and then go meet Lance before his shift ended. Keith breathed a sigh, looking forward to seeing Lance at his workplace, he hadn’t seen him working before, it would be neat. Just as Keith was finished cleaning up the remnants of his lunch, the door jingled and another customer wandered in, keeping him busy for the time being.


	13. Family Trees

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Keith might accidentally... feel... something...  
> What a strange new experience for him.

_“No!”_ Hunk exclaimed, disbelief sparkling in his eyes.

“It’s true,” Lance assured.

Hunk paused in his effort to clean up some of the dishes that had been piling up after the long rush from the day. “But– How– I mean, you swore off dating and now you’ve suddenly decided you’re back on the market? What changed?” he excitedly asked.

Lance shrugged, feigning disinterest. Hunk, being Lance’s best friend, was obviously going to be happy for Lance for putting himself out there again. It was a hard thing for Lance to accept that not everyone he meets was going break his heart so violently and falling in love wasn’t something to fear so deeply. It was okay to love and to be loved, Lance deserved that. Hunk had been telling him that for years, but it was a difficult thing to learn and to rewire within his brain. Yet, Lance was sure that he was starting to realize that he would be alright, that maybe, he could love someone without it being a disaster, that maybe he really did love Keith.

“Oh my god…” Hunk whispered, his eyes going wide. “Who did you meet?!” he breathed out, the words so light on his tongue, like saying them might ruin their meaning. The dishes had been all but abandoned in the excitement of Lance’s news.

“Meet?” Lance repeated, his shoulders rising. Was he that obvious? “I didn’t meet anyone, I’m just saying that going on a date or two wouldn’t kill me,” he shrugged again.

Hunk gasped harshly, “You _did_ meet someone! Who is it? You _have_ to tell me!” His smile was blinding but Lance could feel his cheeks reddening the longer he stayed leaning against the counter under Hunk’s intense stare.

Lance shuffled his feet nervously, not really wanting to give himself away. “Well, technically, we didn’t just meet, so, really, I didn’t meet anyone…” Lance rambled, avoiding the answer altogether.

Hunk narrowed his eyebrows the way he did when Lance was being purposely difficult but he could easily see through the tricks. He didn’t stop smiling. “It’s that guy you moved in with, isn’t it? Keith?” he smirked.

Lance whipped his head up to stare incredulously at Hunk, his cheeks flaring even redder, if that was possible at all, “What?! How did you guess that so fast?!”

“Because he’s literally all you talk about!” Hunk laughed, nudging his friend in the shoulder. “I was actually just worried that you didn’t realize you were into him.”

Lance groaned, draping his body over the counter as dramatically as he could, melting into a puddle of misery. “Am I really that obvious?” he grumbled.

“No, no…” Hunk denied readily. Lance rolled his head over to stare up at Hunk with a pitiful look, noticing the way his best friend winced, holding his tongue. Finally, he let out a heavy sigh, “Okay, yes, you’re very obvious. You asked me for lunch recipes that would impress plant lovers. I don’t even know what that means, Lance.”

“This is terrible! Keith is going to find out!” Lance whined, hiding his face in his arm. A though occurred to him. “What if he already found out?!” Lance shot up, staring frantically at Hunk. “What if he knows, Hunk, what do I do?!”

“Well first,” Hunk said, a bit of concern lacing his voice, “you need to take a deep breath and have some water, because you’re not going to solve anything if you’re panicked. And second, you’re going to have to take the floor, a customer just walked in,” Hunk jutted his chin over Lance’s shoulder to the clear view of the front entrance.

With a look of irritated disgust, Lance muttered, “How am I expected to serve someone when I’m having a crisis?”

“Lance, you’re almost done, promise. One more order for the night, so just do what you do, and then it’s over,” Hunk reassured, smiling comfortingly at his best friend.

Lance took a deep breath, letting Hunk’s words calm him and relax him until he fully believed that he could do anything. “You’re right,” he agreed.

“Then you can go home to Keith,” Hunk finished, leering at the end.

Lance groaned, shoving Hunk’s arm lightly, but with purpose, before heading out onto the floor. It wasn’t that Hunk was wrong though, because he was right. The sooner they closed up shop, the sooner he would be able to get home. Then he could relax and also see Keith. Wow, living with Keith was actually pretty surreal. His heart did a little somersault every time he remembered that he lived with Keith, and not only that, but Keith had been the one to suggest it.

When Lance thought about Keith in that light, it felt happier than it did before. It was still laced at the edges with sadness, but he didn’t feel nearly as guilty and scared about it. Lance knew, deep down, that one day he would eventually have to stop being so afraid and let himself love again, but he hadn’t thought it would be so soon, or that it would actually be because of someone he met, and he definitely didn’t expect it to feel so natural and calming. The entire journey to accept his love had been painful and scary, but now that he had done it, he was glad that he had, because the scar Nyma left on his heart may never go away, but it would heal. In fact, every time Lance looked around at all the people he had in his life who did really love him, who weren’t just playing a game, who would be there for him through anything, the new friends he was making, and his feelings for Keith, he could already tell that the scar had healed.

With that in mind, Lance picked himself up and glanced around the dining area to find the last customer. When he did find the last customer, he had to refrain from letting out an embarrassingly high squeak which had threatened to breech his lips. There, in the corner of the restaurant, was Keith. He was wearing a red leather jacket which Lance had never seen before along with black skinny jeans and his usual fingerless gloves. Lance needed time to recover from seeing Keith sooner than he had expected, which he luckily had since Keith’s attention was on something out of the window to his right.

Lance took a deep breath and let a smile form along his face. It wasn’t difficult to do considering Keith always made him feel like smiling. With a confident breath in, Lance closed the distance between himself and the table. “Hey, plant boy. It’s not enough that I make you dinner, you want me to serve it to you too?” Lance teased, smiling down at Keith with his notepad and pencil ready.

Keith stared up at Lance, unimpressed. “No,” he said deliberately. “I’m just here to walk you home from work, I don’t want anything.” He rolled his eyes as he said it, like that was the most obvious explanation ever.

Lance could feel his heart try to leap out of his throat. Keith never did that. Keith had never come to pick Lance up from work, he had never even come to the diner at all. What was this change? Whatever it was, it had Lance’s mind hollering.

Chuckling to mask the gooey feeling in his heart, Lance pretended to write on his pad of paper. “Alright, one Lance Sanchez to go then,” he joked.

A small laugh escaped Keith, the skin around his eyes crinkling up and his eyes shining. Even when his laugh was a short one, he still instinctively threw his entire body into it, and Lance really loved that about him. As Keith made to stand up, he reminded, “Don’t get too cocky, I just knew you were going to forget your key again. Plus, the gas station over there has my smokes.” The way his eyes shifted and his shoulders rolled easily told Lance that that was an excuse.

“Aw, Keith, you do care about me,” Lance goaded, knocking his shoulder into Keith’s.

Keith scoffed, “No, I care about myself. It’s me who has to let you in every time you forget your key.” He glanced at Lance out of the corner of his eye, his gaze soft and his smile gentle.

Lance grinned back, “And you care enough to let me in.” Keith huffed a laugh at that joke too. “Give me a second to pack everything up and then I’ll be out, okay?” Lance asked, still flashing a smile Keith’s way. They had been doing a lot of that recently, just smiling at each other. It lit Lance’s heart up like a bonfire.

“Alright,” Keith nodded, then he wandered over to the door and stepped out to wait in front of the store. Lance could see him reach into his pocket and grab a cigarette. Probably the same one’s he had just gone to buy at the store.

Lance grinned and ran back to the kitchen. The second he was in the back, he slammed his notepad onto the counter and began ripping his apron off at lightspeed, lest Keith decide that Lance had taken too long and just go without waiting.

“Uh, so, did the customer want anything, or…?” Hunk asked, pausing what he was doing to stare at Lance like he had lost his mind.

Lance hung his apron up as fast as he could before grabbing his olive coat and shoving his arms into the sleeves. “You bet he did!” Lance giggled. “That was Keith, he came to pick me up!”

Hunk whipped his head around to stare out into the front of the store. “What?! That was Keith?! I missed him! I didn’t get to see what he looked like, dammit!” Hunk complained.

“Hunk! You’re not listening! He came to pick me up! He did that himself, I didn’t ask him to! He works in a shop connected to our apartment, he went out of his way just to come walk me home, _Hunk, I’m going to die!”_ Lance was practically squealing as he dramatically danced around the kitchen.

“That’s actually kind of sweet,” Hunk snorted. He watched Lance leap around, excited and giddy over something that would be so small and practically insignificant to anyone else.

Finally, Lance managed to get himself ready to go, still smiling the entire time. He glanced over to Hunk, a sudden thought occurring to him. “He’s waiting for me, I don’t want to take too long,” Lance tried to say it without grinning too much, biting his lip to prevent it, but Hunk could see through him, “so we need to clean fast! I’ll do the front and then come help you with the kitchen?”

Hunk raised an eyebrow, amused at Lance’s attitude. “Forget it. Go, go,” Hunk shooed, swatting his dish drying towel at Lance. “Don’t want to keep your Prince Charming waiting! I can close up.”

Lance shifted his gaze to the door longingly, then back to Hunk. “You’re sure?”

Hunk laughed, “Of course, Lance! It’s worth it to see you so happy.” Hunk was always one to be upfront with his sincerity and it only served to brighten Lance’s mood. He pushed Lance through the door and back out into the main diner. “See you tomorrow, man!” he called.

Lance shouted over his shoulder, “You too!” Lance stepped out into the front dining area. He glanced around at everything, just quickly checking to make sure there wasn’t too much work for Hunk to do. Although he felt a little bit bad about leaving Hunk with closing the shop, there really wasn’t a whole lot to do. Most of it had been done. Lance preferred to clean as he went anyways.

With that out of the way, Lance shimmied his jacket around on his shoulders, adjusting it here or there, playing with the cuffs. Then he shuffled his hair around in hopes it didn’t look too terrible. Lance took one last steadying breath before confidently striding toward the door and pushing it open to breach the chilly night where Keith awaited.

 

◊ ◊ ◊

 

It was a little chilly outside, Keith decided. Not too cold. It was cold enough that he needed his jacket, but not cold enough that he needed his winter jacket. He wasn’t cold, but it was cold outside. There was still a bit of snow here or there, but mostly it was warm. Warmer than it had been, that is. The park was more enjoyable, that was a plus. Keith hated going to the park when the benches were all glossed over with a thin layer of ice. But they weren’t in this weather. This weather was somewhere in between spring and fall, that was what Keith had thought.

Alright, so Keith actually couldn’t give half a shit about the weather. What he really cared about was doing everything in his power to not seem completely weird as he walked through the park with Lance. He was already playing a dangerous game. First, he had to go and do _something_ – he wasn’t even sure what – to set off his friends, and now he was suddenly showing up at Lance’s work. And for what? To walk him home? As if they didn’t live two blocks away.

Keith wasn’t even sure why he was being so strange about this all, or why he wanted to walk with Lance. He told himself that it was because Lance had forgotten his key, but Lance had been right, he could have just waited until Lance got home and then let him in. Keith also told himself it was because he needed to buy more cigarettes and the diner just happened to be conveniently close, but that was a load of bullshit too. Keith had just bought another pack the other day and he really didn’t smoke more than two or three on any given day.

So, the only excuse he could think of for wanting to pick Lance up was not an excuse at all. He just _wanted_ to. For no reason. Keith couldn’t explain why he did, not even if his life was on the line for it. He just inexplicably felt the desire to walk with Lance home, make sure he was safe, be near him, talk to him. Which didn’t make sense to Keith at all because he would be able to do all those things as soon as Lance got home. Walking to Lance’s work though, that ensured all those things sooner.

Keith must have been losing his mind. What other explanation was there? How else could one explain the fact that Keith’s heart constricted painfully just from glancing to the side and seeing Lance’s content little smile. His ruffled hair shifted in the breeze and his cheeks were a light pink tone from the slight chill. His blue eyes scanned the sky, watching the birds flutter by through the night air, and Keith was powerless to stop the thought that Lance’s eyes were bluer than the sky itself. Even the bounce in Lance’s step was intriguing and worth noticing. Lance and Keith were the only one’s in the park that late at night, but Keith was positive that in a sea of a million people, he’d still be caught on Lance.

He just didn’t understand what that meant.

Lance opened his mouth to speak and all Keith could do was hope that he didn’t say a word about the fact that Keith had come to pick him up. If Lance asked Keith why he had done it, then Keith would have to put that question on hold until he figured out the answer himself.

“What’s your family like?” Lance asked.

Keith’s feet stuttered, not ready for the question. “Huh?”

“Your family,” Lance reiterated, removing his eyes from the sky to meet Keith’s gaze, “could you tell me about them? You don’t have to talk about your father.”

For a moment, Keith thought about all the members of his family and what sort of things he could talk about. Quietly, Keith answered, “I’m the youngest. My sister, Acxa, is three years older than me. She’s really calm and collected about everything, even when she’s angry. My brother, Shiro, he’s seven years older than me. He’s also really calm and collected too, except he’s someone you feel like you can trust the moment you see him, while Acxa looks like she could break your neck with her thumb. Basically, they’re both the complete opposite of me…” Keith trailed off.

“I don’t know, you look like you could break my neck with your thumb too,” Lance joshed, smacking a gentle hand into Keith’s forearm.

Keith chuckled, tilting his head back to stare up at the night sky. “Thanks, I think,” Keith replied, a smile still on his face. “There’s also my mother, Krolia. She used to be really happy and optimistic, but last time I saw her, she was just really tired. I didn’t talk to her a lot then,” Keith mused. It made him wonder what his mother was up to. “My father, Akira, I always thought he was just content all the time, but actually, he just put on a face so none of us would think anything was wrong. I think Acxa knew though.” Keith paused, choosing to look at some point off in the distance for some time. “So, yeah… That’s my family.”

Lance hummed contemplatively, “There’s one thing I’m confused on though.”

Keith glanced over to him, seeing his thoughtful frown. “What’s that?”

“Acxa, Shiro, Krolia, Akira,” he listed all the names out on his fingers. Then, he poked a finger into Keith’s shoulder and with the harshest pronunciation he could, said, _“Keith.”_ He raised his eyebrows ridiculously high. _“One of these things is not like the others,”_ he sang.

Keith laughed, and not a small chuckle this time, a full on, from the gut, laugh. His whole body was thrown into the motion and his voice echoed through the park. He stopped walking, chuckling for a moment before replying, “My name’s Kei. I just go by Keith.”

“What? Why?” Lance questioned.

“I like it better.” Keith shrugged. He never really was a fan of Kei, it wasn’t a big deal.

Lance grinned, “I like Keith better too.”

Keith felt his stomach twist at the words Lance said and his heart leaped at the smile Lance directed at him. He turned away again, keeping his eyes on the road ahead in hopes Lance wouldn’t notice how affected he became at such a small interaction.

Luckily, Lance jogged ahead to walk backwards in front of Keith, meeting his eye as he filled the empty silence. “Hey, when the snow melts, you know what it becomes?” he asked, a twinkle in his eyes.

“Water?” Keith squinted in confusion.

Lance’s smile disappeared to make way for his unimpressed stare. “No,” he said pointedly. The grin returned a moment later, “It becomes spring!” Keith watched as Lance did some jazz hands, nearly tripping over his own shoe while walking backwards. “April showers bring May flowers! And you know what you’re all about? Flowers. All the flowers you love so much will bloom.” He stared around the park dreamily. “I’m excited for that.”

Keith stared at Lance a moment too long, that feeling he couldn’t identify welling up within him, stronger than ever. He could almost grasp the edge of it, almost able to tell what it meant, but not quite. His fingers were just grazing the name of the feeling, the word just on the tip of his tongue. A familiar and dangerous word.

Lance’s voice broke through his concentration, “We better hurry home or else it’s going to be too late to watch a movie, Keith, you’re so slow!”

And just like that, the feeling escaped him along with a word to identify it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have my first exam today, y'all, wish me some fucking luck, it's a diploma and it'll decide my future ! ! ! !


	14. Choking on Petals

Lance glanced into Keith’s room, quiet as he could be. The boy was laying in his bed with the blanket up to his ears. All that was visible of him was a tuft of hair poking out from beneath the covers. As Lance pushed the door open, he listened to the silence in the air and smiled, knowing that Keith was awake.

In the month that he and Keith had been living together, Lance had come to realize that Keith was prone to snoring. It wasn’t loud or annoying snoring, in fact, it was so quiet that Lance had to try very hard to hear it. More than a snore, the noises Keith made were like small hums. The first time Lance had heard it, he had to take a moment of deep breathing to calm down his racing heart because it was honestly just too adorable. How was it possible that Keith could get even cuter? Lance hadn’t thought it was, but he was proven wrong.

Lance also learned that Keith would stop humming around the time he was waking it up. He wasn’t even sure if Keith was aware of any of this, but Lance had been secretly using it to his advantage. Every morning, Keith always woke up earlier than Lance, much earlier. It made sense since he had to open up his shop every morning and Lance didn’t, but on Monday’s and Wednesday’s, when Keith opened shop later in the day than usual, he didn’t even bother waking up for a long time. These were the days when Lance would make an especially big breakfast and sneak into Keith’s bedroom, just like he was doing right then.

Lance listened to the steady rhythm of Keith’s breathing, free of any humming. Keith was awake. Well, not completely, but he was finished sleeping and would be waking up soon. Opening the door as wide as he could, Lance waved his arms violently, wafting the scent of breakfast from the kitchen into Keith’s room. Nothing happened. Lance frowned, standing there for a moment with his arms hanging limply at his sides. An idea occurred to him. Rushing back to the kitchen, Lance grabbed the plate of freshly made bacon from the table and hurried back to Keith’s room. He waved it around the room some more, studying Keith as he did.

There was movement. A shuffling came from beneath the blanket and the tuft of hair wavered. Groggily, Keith’s head emerged from the blankets to stare at Lance with hazy eyes. There was confusion there, but also interest and hope. Lance waved the bacon around again, a smile forming over his face at the sight of Keith with his dazed look and his bedhead. He blinked a couple times, squinting at the bright light from the windows.

“Good morning!” Lance greeted, presenting the bacon to Keith.

Keith perked up a bit, still sleepy in the way he stared at Lance. “Mornin’,” Keith slurred. “You make breakfast?”

“Yeah, pancakes and bacon. Nothing too fancy,” Lance wandered back into the kitchen, trailing his arm with the bacon plate out behind him as he went, enticing Keith. “Get up if you want some,” he called. As he came up to the table, he set the plate down. Standing back, he was able to admire his setup. A plate of fluffy pancakes made from scratch, some perfectly cooked bacon with a chewy middle and crispy edges, some orange juice, and a container of sweet syrup. The perfect breakfast for a lazy Wednesday morning.

From the confines of Keith’s room, Lance could hear the lumbering sounds of a grumbly man in an oversized hoodie shuffling into the kitchen, blearily joining the land of the living. Keith’s hair stuck up at odd angles but he didn’t seem to care. “Can I eat it?” he asked, not unlike a child.

Lance smiled, gesturing to the meal on the table dramatically. “Dig in, Keithy, it’s the best breakfast you’ll ever have,” he answered, proud of himself.

Keith blinked slowly, nodding along. “Your food is always the best,” he mumbled as he settled down into the chair.

Lance bit his lip, turning away so Keith wouldn’t see his cheeks tinting pink. “You know it,” he said, albeit, a little weakly. As Keith began to pick out his share, Lance slipped into the chair opposite him. He grabbed some pancakes and bacon, eating in comfortable silence with Keith.

About halfway through his first pancake, Keith seemed to wake up enough to remember some important information. He hummed, pointing his fork at Lance as he struggled to finish chewing his piece. “I just remembered, I’m going to visit my siblings this weekend, so the apartment is yours. I’m trusting you to water a few plants though.”

Lance nodded. “I can do that. Did something happen? Are they alright?”

“Yeah, they’re fine. It’s just Acxa’s birthday, I’ll only be gone two days,” Keith informed him, mushing a piece of pancake into the puddle of syrup on his plate.

“Oh! That’s fun! Tell her happy birthday from me!” Lance brightly crowed.

Keith paused what he was saying to snort, an amused grin sticking to his face. “She doesn’t know who you are, but I’ll let her know,” he promised.

“What?! She should know who I am,” Lance argued.

Keith tittered around pancake piece. “Yeah, she should…” he muttered.

Lance’s heart palpitated and a couple butterflies formed in his stomach. He had those feelings quite often nowadays. Ever since moving in with Keith, Lance’s life seemed to get better and his heart seemed to open up more. Feeling that way again was like a breath of fresh air. He quickly switched the subject in order to make sure that his feelings didn’t escape his throat in the form of butterflies.

“So… are your parents going, too, or…?” he cautiously asked, unsure of whether that was an appropriate question or not.

Keith’s smile slowly slipped off his face as he stared intently at the food on his plate. “I don’t know what happened to them,” he decided on, his voice surprisingly level.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to–” Lance began, only to be cut off by Keith furrowing his eyebrows and waving his fork in front of Lance.

“No, no, don’t do that,” Keith complained. He stared off into the distance as he spoke, recalling everything, “I don’t know when it started, but my father was always cheating on my mother, always going off to hook up with women who he didn’t really care about. When I was around ten, I guess he found one he did care about, because he left and never came back. My mother chased after him and also never came back. So, no, I don’t expect them to be there for Acxa’s birthday,” Keith concluded, a smile on his face that told of someone who was still hurt by the memory.

Lance wasn’t sure what to say, letting the words hang in the air. “I didn’t know…” he started off.

“I know you didn’t. That’s why I told you, because it’s something I want you to know,” Keith said with purpose, staring directly at Lance to convey is message. Lance met his gaze, still unsure of what Keith meant by that or how to respond. It was a heavy thing to learn, especially when it was brought up so abruptly, but Lance felt that it was important information, he felt as though there was a shift in his relationship with Keith. Vaguely, he wondered what kind of effect that would have on Keith and whether or not he expected everyone in his life to leave for something better, for greener grass on the other side of the fence. Lance wouldn’t leave.

Keith’s eyes shifted to the window past Lance’s shoulder, a softened look overtaking him. “You have the day off work, right?” he questioned, his tone lighter.

“Yeah, why?” Lance replied, twisting around to follow Keith’s attention. It was a sunny day, not too bright and hot to the point where it wasn’t pleasant to be outside, but still cool enough that they could wear hoodies.

“Go for a walk with me,” Keith all but instructed.

Lance turned back around to find that Keith was no longer looking at him or the window, but rather, intently eating his pancakes and bacon. “Alright... You just want to see the park flowers, don’t you?” Lance teased.

“No…” Keith weakly defended, diving deeper into his pancakes.

Lance could see through him. He laughed, “So predictable, plant boy, but I could go for a walk.”

 

◊ ◊ ◊

 

Keith brushed his hand over the leaves of a tree at his right, relishing in the beauty of the blooms on it’s branches. Lance may have been poking fun at him, but he wasn’t wrong, Keith really did want to go on a walk to see the flowers in the park. Keith wasn’t about to admit that out loud though, not even if Lance had already caught him.

Another tree a little bit farther away caught his eye. Without really focusing on where Lance was, Keith hurried over to the tree, trying to make it appear as though he wasn’t bolting straight for a pretty plant, because that would just be too cliché of him. Even his little half-jog wasn’t enough to fool Lance, because Keith could hear him chuckling to himself somewhere behind Keith.

“Shut up, they’re in bloom,” Keith called over his shoulder as he reached the tree. Dark red berries hung in bunches from their stalks, nearly black in how dark they were. Keith gasped softly, lifting a hand to feel the berries. To his delight, they were ripe.

“Are those blackberries?” Lance asked as he wandered up to stand next to Keith.

Keith didn’t even turn, too busy plucking a couple berries off the tree, checking the firmness of each one. “Prunus Virginiana; chokecherries,” Keith replied.

Lance hummed, “What about the one you were just looking at over there?” he pointed off to a different tree.

Glancing away from his berries for a moment, Keith studied the tree Lance was referring to. “Morus; mulberries,” Keith named.

“What?!” Lance exclaimed. He glared around the park until he found another tree. “That one?”

Keith followed his attention again, “That’s a potentilla, Lance, they don’t even have black berries.” Keith gave a pointed look to Lance.

Lance’s face turned red with embarrassment before he glared farther up the trail to another tree. “That one over there, that’s a blackberry, right?” he asked, confident and irritated at the same time, as though he were daring the tree to be anything else.

Keith snorted, “That’s another chokecherry.”

“Where are the blackberries?!” Lance shouted, waving his arms around at the trees angrily.

“Blackberries don’t grow around here,” Keith answered, tittering a little bit at Lance’s outrage over something as simple as blackberries. Keith fumbled around with the chokecherries in his hands, popping one into his mouth and discreetly spitting the seed into his palm.

“That’s bullshit,” Lance mumbled, still staring intensely around the park for a plant he hadn’t pointed out yet.

Keith shoved a handful of berries toward Lance, an offering. Maybe if he had some chokecherries, he’d be less upset about the lack of blackberries in the park. Did Lance even like blackberries or was he just trying to prove that he could name at least one plant? Keith wasn’t sure, but he was amused. If Lance was a fan of blackberries, Keith could pick some up on his next shopping trip. Keith himself wasn’t a huge fan of them, not that that mattered.

Lance accepted the offer of the chokecherries, rolling them around in his hands and staring at them. Keith watched him for a moment, then turned his gaze back up to the tree.

He could vividly remember the chokecherries that had been in the backyard when he was growing up. He remembered how beautiful he had thought they were. The only reason they were planted in the first place was that his father loved them so much. Every time they were in bloom, he would spend his time grooming them and looking after them. At the time, Keith had found it to be a great dedication and love for the plants, and he had admired his father for it, but looking back, he realized that father had spent more time with the trees than he had with Keith’s mother. That was when his father was even home at all. When his father had left for good, Keith kept up the garden of trees all on his own, just in case his father ever returned. He never did.

The sudden sounds of wheezing and hacking yanked Keith from his thoughts and he whirled around. Lance stood there, chokecherries in one hand, and the other hand slamming into his chest as he coughed up a chokecherry seed. It landed on the park path, bouncing away into the grass.

“What a dirty trick,” Lance hissed at the seed.

Keith stared at Lance a moment, unsure of what had even just happened. Then, he abruptly burst into laughter, unable to control the way his body threw itself backwards and his voice echoed through the empty park. He nearly dropped his chokecherries in the process, but he managed to hold on. “Have you– Have you never had a chokecherry?” he heaved out. Keith tried breathing deeply to calm his laughter, but it just poured out of him in minute giggles.

Lance glared at the seed some more, then at Keith, then at the chokecherries in his hands. “No!” he all but yelled at the berries, blaming them for his misfortune. “I know it’s called a chokecherry, but I didn’t think I’d actually choke if I ate one!”

Keith cackled again, clutching his stomach as it hurt too much. “You’re supposed to spit it out!” he told Lance. Keith stood, relaxing himself from all his laughing. Picking through his handful of berries, Keith chose one and ate it, making sure to demonstrate how he spat out the centre of it. The pit landed in the grass, not too far from Lance’s.

Grimacing, Lance picked up another cherry. “Why can’t they grow seedless…?” he complained. Just as he was about to bring the berry to his mouth, he instantly pulled it away. In a pained voice, he forced out, “I can’t do it, I might die.”

Rolling his eyes, Keith ripped the berry out of Lance’s hands. “You’re so dramatic…” he absently muttered. Pitting cherries wasn’t too difficult. With a couple calculated cuts and a well aimed push, Keith easily and effectively pitted the chokecherry. He dropped the seed onto the pathway. Glancing back up at Lance’s amazed expression, Keith held the berry up for Lance’s inspection. “Open your mouth,” Keith instructed.

Lance paused, his eyes widening. “I’m sorry, what?”

“Open your mouth,” Keith repeated, taking a step forward with the chokecherry.

Lance swallowed heavily, staring directly into Keith’s eyes, and for a moment, Keith could have sworn that weird feeling had returned it. Lance opened his mouth slowly, almost hesitantly, and Keith felt the lurch of his heart. The strange and new feeling he had been experiencing was one thing, but the way his heart leaped in his chest, as though it were trying to break free of his chest to get to Lance, that was an entirely different thing. For a moment, Keith forgot what he was doing, he was just too busy staring at Lance’s mouth. Quickly, Keith jammed the berry into Lance’s mouth, careful not to actually touch any part of him, and he immediately backed away afterwards.

From afar, Keith noticed the pink tinging of Lance’s cheeks, but neither of them chose to acknowledge it. Keith probably wasn’t doing much better, but he didn’t need any proof.

“These are, uh, actually really… good…” Lance stammered out, looking anywhere but at Keith.

“Yeah?” Keith clarified, tilting his head in an attempt to catch Lance’s eye.

Lance nodded. “Yeah.” He took another one, shoving it into his mouth without pitting it first. Then, to Keith’s surprise, he grabbed yet another, pushing it into his cheek right next to the first one. “We should keep walking,” Lance suggested. His words were muffled by the numerous chokecherries he was fitting into his cheeks. Keith felt his eyebrows furrow in concern. He opened his mouth to say something, but he wasn’t sure what. Instead, he just watched Lance walk away while shoving a third berry into his mouth.

Somewhere down the path, Lance had finally managed to swallow all his chokecherries, spitting the seeds out the farther they went. Keith was glad that Lance had done that, to an extent, because it gave him time to calm down from the weird incident from before. Not that Lance shoving his face full of berries a moment ago wasn’t weird, it was just a different weird, a weird that Keith felt he could handle. At least they weren’t both blushing anymore. Why had Keith tried to feed Lance? That was really weird. Why was Keith being so weird? Why couldn’t he stop himself?

“So,” Lance spoke up once he had completely finished the berries, “you like chokecherries?” It wasn’t much of a conversation starter, but it wasn’t like Keith could have thought of anything better.

“Yeah, we used to grow them in my backyard,” Keith replied, staring at the various trees around them, all in different stages of bloom.

Lance glanced at him as they walked side-by-side, “You’ve always been a plant nerd?”

Keith huffed a laugh, slowing his walking pace as they came up to a more private and wooded area with lots of bushes. “I suppose. It was my father who liked the chokecherries…” Keith reached above himself to grab at a branch from one of the nearby chokecherries. His hands inspected the leaves absently, petting them gently, greeting them. “I actually brought you out here because I wanted to talk about that…” Keith whispered. It felt as though his voice could be heard from anywhere in the park, by anyone, but he knew only Lance would hear.

“You wanted to talk about your father?” Lance reiterated, confused. Keith couldn’t blame him.

Keith slowly dipped his head, agreeing with Lance. “I wanted to say that I’m sorry,” Keith quietly said.

Lance was taken aback. A frown worried at his face, an unpleasant expression, when Keith thought about it. “What?” he breathed, almost like a filler for his voice. Lance was vocal; when there was nothing to say, Lance would fill the silence with anything, not that Keith minded much.

“I’ll never understand my father, and I won’t ever forgive him either…” Keith continued. He took a moment to sigh, emotions welling up within him and he could feel his expression mirror Lance’s, turning sour quickly. “Fuck, he pisses me off…” Keith growled, staring hard at the branch in his hands. For a moment, he wanted to tear it off, to take his frustrations out on it and what it represented to Keith, but that was the entire point of this speech and of bringing Lance to the park at all. It was to remind himself that not everything was meant to remind him of his father, because his father wasn’t indicative of the whole.

Keith sighed, letting the tree branch go. As he spoke again, his eyes closed, focused on his breathing, “When I was angry at you, it was because you reminded me of my father, I told you that. It was just me venting…” His eyes opened, taking in the plants around him. His gaze fell on Lance, filling him with a sense of renewal and relief, especially knowing that this was what he had now, not a broken family, but a tiny, mismatched and awkward whole one. “I’m sorry. You’re nothing like my father,” Keith concluded. He flicked his eyes between Lance’s brilliant blue ones, trying his best to convey a message to Lance’s surprised face.

Lance didn’t take his eyes off of Keith, just staring at him as he took in the words that Keith had said. It was something that had been weighing on Keith’s mind for some time. Sure, he had apologized to Lance around the time that they had met, but it wasn’t enough, not to Keith. His father and Lance were not the same person, he knew that. Lance was a good person, a beautiful person, a kind-hearted person who went out of his way for the ones he loved, a generous and loving person who cared about his family and treating his friends as family. Lance wasn’t like his father, Lance had never been like his father. Keith had come to realize something in his time spent around Lance, and that was that Keith really needed to let go sometimes and stop being so afraid of becoming his father, because he wasn’t his father, just like Lance wasn’t either.

“Keith… it’s not just that, I–” Lance didn’t finish his sentence before a shuffling and a low mewling alerted the pair, drawing their attention to a low hanging bush. A brown box poked out from beneath the leaves. Lance immediately left the conversation in favour of pulling the box out. A small red Somali and a long, twiggy Russian Blue sat in the box, curled up together on a blanket. They both stared up at Lance, the Russian Blue mewling again.

“Cats…?” Keith raised an eyebrow.

Lance whipped around. His eyes were wide and wild. There was a panicked, stricken expression on his face and Keith had to take a step back. “We have to take them home!”

“Whoa, what?” Keith halted. “Take them home? No, we don’t. Someone else will take them.” Lance moved back down into the bushes. “Hey, Lance, don’t pick up that– _Lance!”_ Lance picked up the box, ignoring Keith entirely.

“I can’t leave them here!” he cried, hugging the box of cats closer to his body, shielding them. They mewled louder as the box was moved around, but didn’t protest.

“They’ll eat all my plants!” Keith argued.

Lance shook his head frantically, “No, they won’t! I’ll feed them!”

“You have to work,” Keith pointed out, watching as Lance began to waddle down the path with the box in his arms.

“I’ll quit!” he shouted.

That kicked Keith into gear. He jogged down the trail after Lance. “No, you’re not quitting your job for some cats,” he tried his best to talk some sense into Lance, but the man just hurried along with his cats in his box, which he had picked up from the bushes.

“But Keith! They’re so small and helpless! We can’t leave them to die!” Lance stared into Keith’s eyes, using his puppy dog eyes to persuade Keith. Or were they kitty cat eyes? Keith didn’t understand how that whole thing worked, but he could feel his position changing.

With a groan, Keith gave in, “Fine! Okay, I’ll watch them while you’re at work, but don’t quit your fucking job!”

Lance paused his step, his eyes filling with a newfound joy, brilliant in the shine they created. “Keith!” he gasped. “Thank you! Thank you, thank you, thank you!” And with one final grin, Lance hurried off down the trail again, back to their apartment. Keith could only sigh, wondering what he had just agreed to as he followed along.


	15. Dogs and Cats and Mice! Oh No...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! Just a little note here letting y'all know that I finally got around to finding a platform for the reference pictures I make for fics. I never really meant to post them anywhere at all, they were more for me, but I figured that they might add something to the stories. So, I have a [tumblr](http://sheksper.tumblr.com/) now! You can go check out drawings I make for my fics there. I won't post a lot other than that, and I don't draw for every fic, they're also not super high quality. Right now, I only have pictures for The Boy from the Other Side, Clouds for My Troubles, and Chivalry Is Dead, as well as a drawing for Chivalry Is Dead done by [mutukau](https://mutukau.tumblr.com/)  
> There won't be any drawings for this fic as it's almost over and didn't really gain a whole lot of traction, but there will be some for my next fic, so stay tuned, I suppose! Now, on with the chapter!

“Allura, I need your help,” Keith sighed, trudging his way up to the café counter once again.

She raised an eyebrow, already moving about to start making his usual drink. “I’m not going to fill another ice cream tub with coffee, Keith, it’s not healthy.”

Even Pidge nodded at that. She was sat at her usual stool next to the counter, sipping what looked like lemonade. When Pidge agreed it was too much coffee, that’s how you knew you went overboard.

Keith paused, staring at Allura with an unpleasant face. “I wasn’t going to ask that, but it was a good idea at the time.”

“Yeah, drinking your weight in coffee sounds like a great idea,” Pidge snorted.

Keith glared at her as hard as he could, causing her to quickly shift her attention back to her drink to hide her smirk. _“Anyways,”_ Keith said pointedly, “I need to know how you take care of your mice.”

Allura’s hands froze. She lifted her head slowly, making eye contact with Keith as she did. “My mice?” she echoed.

“Yeah. What do you feed them? What do they play with? That sort of thing,” Keith elucidated, making vague hand gestures the entire time. He stared hard as his hands as he spoke, glaring, like he really didn’t want to be asking in the first place.

Allura continued to stare at Keith like he had grown a second head, and even Pidge was watching him incredulously. “Uh… Oats…” she answered, confused as ever. “Bread too. Sometimes seeds or rice. Dandelion heads if they’re in the backyard,” she listed off some foods. “They like tubes to run around in, and they have a wheel which they really seem to enjoy.”

Keith nodded along, staring back at Allura intensely as though he were attempting to commit that all to memory. When Allura was finished talking, she raised her eyebrows, hoping Keith would elaborate on why he needed that information. “Will that work with cats too?” he suddenly asked.

“What?” Pidge said, still observing this entire conversation unfolding.

“I… beg your pardon…?” Allura sputtered out, even more confused than she was before.

Keith sighed, turning his gaze to the drink that Allura had completely forgotten about making. It was still in her hand, probably going cold. “Lance found some cats in a box at the park, so I guess we own cats now.”

Allura scrunched up her face. “How does that concern my mice?”

“I don’t know how to look after a cat,” Keith explained, fatigue dripping from his voice.

“Clearly,” Pidge laughed. “Cats aren’t the same as mice, Keith.” She sipped her drink again.

Frowning, Keith glanced between Pidge and Allura. “They’re not?” he asked. He was now the confused one.

“Nope,” Pidge replied, popping the ‘P.’

“Oh.” Keith stood there, not sure what to do with himself. “Pidge, you have a dog, right?”

Pidge groaned, “Oh my god, no, Keith! They’re not like dogs either!”

Keith threw up his hands, completely perplexed, “How are they different?! They all have four paws and tails!”

Allura sighed, shaking her head as if to say Keith was hopeless, while Pidge released a whining groan so loud that a few people at a table on the other end of the café turned their heads, mildly irritated.

“That’s not how it works…” Allura informed him. There was pain in her eyes as she had to explain to Keith that cats couldn’t be looked after the same way as dogs and mice.

“How is it that you can name three million different plants and take care of all of them, but you were completely ready to feed dandelions and oats to a cat without thinking there was anything wrong there?” Pidge interrogated.

“Because plants don’t yell at me when they’re hungry!” complained Keith, tossing his hands up in exasperation. He glared over at the cup in Allura’s hand, making a grabby motion with his hand. She kicked into gear, handing the now-lukewarm coffee to Keith. He drank it anyway, not saying anything about the heat, just dropping his money on the counter and dumping the change into the tip jar like usual.

Allura and Pidge both looked just as over it as Keith was feeling. Cats were hard.

“You shouldn’t be in charge of cats,” Pidge shot.

Grimacing, while pretending not to grimace, Allura nodded slowly, “I have to agree with Pidge. You did say Lance was helping to look after them, right…?”

Pidge brightened at that, sitting up straighter in her chair suddenly. “Yeah, that’s right, you did say that! And what I’m hearing is that Lance wanted cats and you didn’t, but you’re letting him keep the cats, and going out of your way to learn how to take care of them because, what? He has a nice smile?” Pidge teased, amusement glistening in her eyes as she leaned forward.

Keith’s eyebrows furrowed and he couldn’t help the way his cheeks heated up, flushing an embarrassing red. Pidge could see it a mile away and her grin curled ever wider. Even Allura seemed to take notice of this, leering at Keith across the counter with a knowing glint. Keith didn’t know what she could possibly know about, since there was nothing to know about. Unless there was and Keith just didn’t know about it. Keith was confused and embarrassed.

“No,” Keith spat. They stared at one another. Pidge’s eyebrows wiggled. Allura’s lips pursed. Keith’s frown deepened. Finally, Keith broke, “It was his eyes, okay, and you would have kept the cats too.” He crossed his arms defensively while Pidge broke out into laughter with Allura giggling right along with her. “Whatever! Are you going to help me with the cats or not?!” Keith bitterly spoke, trying his best to drown out their laughter with his own voice.

“Nah, dude! That’s all on you!” Pidge crowed.

Allura shook her head, and through her chortling, she managed to say, “Sorry, Keith, I don’t know anything about cats!”

Keith huffed, waiting for them to stop teasing him. They didn’t. With a scowl, Keith gripped his cold coffee as hard as he could and stormed out of the café, muttering about oats the entire time. He didn’t need them to figure out cats. Keith was great with cats, they’d soon see.

 

◊ ◊ ◊

 

As Keith stepped into his shop, he was immediately suspicious. From upstairs, he could hear yelling, and not the usual yelling when Lance was on the phone or when he was watching a show where something intense happened. This was more like distressed yelling. Begging, even. Keith furrowed his eyebrows and hung his red leather jacket up on the hook. With cautious footsteps and a plastic bag in his hand, Keith silently made his way up the stairs. He couldn’t make out what Lance was saying, but it didn’t sound good.

Reaching the top of the stairs, Keith quietly unlocked the door and pushed it open. Now Keith really wasn’t sure what he was expecting, but looking back on it, this was probably exactly it.

All around, the apartment was trashed. A plate broken in half was on the floor, there was a puddle of milk on the linoleum, some of Lance’s knick knacks were toppled over, one of Keith’s upstairs houseplants was on its side with a trail of dirt pawprints leading across the coffee table, and to top everything off, the entire couch was covered in a thin blanket of cat hair. Amongst the entire mess was Lance, his hair everywhere, his clothes strewn, his eyes wild and desperate, on his hands and knees as he slowly crawled across the room to catch the furry reddish cat. The twiggy grey cat was watching everything go down from their perch on top of the television stand.

“C’mere, kitty,” Lance was whispering, making himself as small as he could while slinking towards the cat. The cat stared at him, unamused. Finally, Lance lunged, quickly scooping the cat up before they could react, but falling over in the process. Cat tangled in his arms, Lance lay on the carpet, laughing to himself in a way that suggested he had been trying to catch the cat for a long, long time. He abruptly stopped upon noticing Keith, who had just been standing there, observing everything with a faraway look in his eyes.

“Oh,” Lance said, his voice echoing in the silence of the wrecked apartment. The cat continued to struggle. “Welcome back,” he smiled, although it wobbled and his eyes were wide with fear of what Keith would say about the apartment. The cat on the television stand chose that moment to jump down and calmly wander over to Lance. The cat stared down at Lance. Lance stared up at the cat. Then, without warning, the cat suddenly lifted their paw and began bapping Lance on the nose with rapid speed. Lance screeched. Keith sighed.

“Look, it hates you. We should take them to an animal shelter,” Keith suggested. He removed his shoes and sauntered further into the room.

Lance finished his battle with the cats, struggling to keep them both wrangled but also wanting to drop them and rush out the door. The grey one stood on the back of Lance’s neck with their front paws on his head. The reddish one still needed to be held, lest they sprint away again. “No! We can’t! Look, they love me, and they’ll love you too! You already agreed, so you’re not allowed to–”

Keith cut him off by holding up the plastic bag full of cat supplies.

After his shameful encounter with Allura and Pidge, who both adamantly insisted that cats were not the same as dogs and mice, Keith made his way to a pet store a couple blocks away. The girl who was working there was much more helpful than Keith’s own friends had been. He may have been slightly bitter about that incident, but at least the clerk didn’t judge him for being a first-time cat owner, that was nice. To some extent, Keith didn’t believe that he needed all the things she was recommending to him because it was probably just so she could sell more, but every time he was about to put something back on the shelf, his mind would supply him with an image of a smiling Lance and he – completely of his own choice and not anything to do with Lance – would abruptly change his mind and shove it back into his cart with a grumble and a light blush.

So, basically, what Keith was saying was that Lance better appreciate the lengths Keith had gone to for these two cats he didn’t even want.

And Lance did appreciate it. A lot. The second his eyes landed on the bag, they lit up, his entire face brightened, and he grabbed for the bag excitedly. “You didn’t…” Lance muttered. He opened the pet store bag, pulling out various cat supplies. “You did! Keith, what the hell?!”

Lance picked out a smaller bag from within the bulk bag and poured it out onto the floor. There were fake mice that squeaked, fake mice that didn’t squeak, balls that jingled, balls that didn’t jingle, hard plastic balls, soft fabric balls, feathers on sticks, strings on sticks, and even a stick with a fish on it. This one, Keith couldn’t even blame on the saleslady’s kind disposition and her persuasive words. She had actually told him that one or two types of toys would be just fine, but Keith had been the one to practically swipe the entire shelf into the cart while grumbling about a man who would be upset if he didn’t get the best for their cats.

Keith wasn’t sure when he had started calling them ‘their’ cats, especially since he hadn’t even wanted them in the first place. They were kind of cute though… And Lance really liked them…

“Keith! You do love them, I knew it!” Lance exclaimed, watching the cats race around with the new toys while still exploring the contents of the bag. There were a bunch of cat food bags and toiletries littered about the floor.

“They’re… alright…” Keith relented, seating himself on the carpet beside Lance.

Lance grinned up at him, “Whatever you say, Keithy boy, I know the truth now.” He pointed over to the cats, still smiling, “We have to name them! Your cat is the Somali, and I’m taking the Russian Blue.”

Keith’s mind blanked out halfway through that sentence. “The what?”

“The Somali, that’s the red one, and the other one is a Russian Blue!” Lance explained again.

Keith stared at Lance with a flat look, then he turned back to the cats, pointing at each of them in succession, “That’s a cat, and that’s a cat.”

Lance sputtered, “Wha–? No! They’re different breeds! Somalis are really energetic and determined, but they’re also really affectionate, whereas Russian Blues are playful and quiet, so you have to pick a suitable name for your cat, Keith.” Lance crossed his arms, clearly challenging Keith to argue about cats with him.

“Fine.” Keith rolled his eyes.

“I’m thinking something beautiful for a beautiful blue, like Cobalt, or Lilia,” Lance brainstormed, smiling gently at his cats.

Keith hummed in agreement, “Cornflower.”

“I’m not naming my cat Cornflower,” Lance protested.

“Jean,” Keith suggested instead.

“Did you grow up on a farm?” Lance sarcastically asked.

Crossing his arms defensively, Keith leaned back against the edge of the couch. “Name your cat yourself then,” he huffed.

“I will. In fact, I’ve got it!” Lance excitedly announced. “Señorita Azura de la Mora III!”

Keith squinted at Lance. “That’s ridiculous,” he said, gesturing vaguely to the cats again.

Lance shook his head, denying what Keith was saying, “No, she deserves a beautiful name, and that’s what she gets. You must address her by her full name every time,” he decreed.

“I’m not doing that,” Keith deadpanned.

Lance frowned, raising a single eyebrow at Keith. “Yeah? What’d you name your cat then?”

“Russel,” Keith answered immediately.

After a second of pause, Lance’s face slowly morphed into one of confusion. “Keith, she’s a girl.”

“Then she’s a girl named Russel,” Keith defended, an edge to his tone.

Lance laughed suddenly, no longer angry or irritated. “Why would you do that?” he chuckled out, staring at Keith with an amused smile.

Shrugging, Keith imitated Lance’s own reasoning, “She deserves a strong name, and that’s what she gets.”

Still giggling to himself, Lance watched the cats with a newfound happiness. “Señorita Azura de la Mora III and Russel. I love it, I love them,” he decided.

And Keith couldn’t help but agree as he watched the kittens rush around after a plastic ball together. Seeing them happy and seeing Lance happy would be worth the effort. This was Keith’s family, and he really wouldn’t change it for the world. They stayed there on the floor for a while, just watching their cats and muttering between themselves, neither wanting to get up or break the moment in any way. And for the first time, Keith was actually glad Lance picked up the cats.

 

◊ ◊ ◊

 

Lance had lived alone for awhile by this point, he liked to think that he would be able to look after the apartment for a few days while Keith was off visiting his sister for her birthday. But, Lance had never looked after two cats and a bajillion plants in an apartment twice as big as his old one alone, and especially not while the rightful owner of said place was expecting him to. Still, Lance wasn’t deterred. This was his place too, and even though he had never owned cats before and have never owned potted plants before, he could look after them. It would all be fine. Besides, it was only two days. Lance was confident.

So, as Lance stood in front of the door to the upper floor apartment to see Keith off, he didn’t even have to lie when he told Keith that he had everything under control and nothing bad would happen. Keith raised a single skeptical eyebrow, but he didn’t say anything, so Lance counted it as a win. Keith believed in him.

“I’ll be back in two days. Sunday night, maybe Monday morning. I left instructions for the plants on the counter downstairs, and yes, I drew pictures like you asked,” Keith sighed, his lip quirking up at the side. Lance grinned widely. “If there’s an emergency with the grimalkin, don’t call me, I can’t help you,” Keith concluded.

“Don’t worry, your plants will be well watered and showered in bouts of my love. Only the best,” Lance dramatically stated. “Also, stop calling our children ‘grimalkin,’” Lance complained with a frown. He hugged the cats closer to his chest. They struggled against his arms a little bit, but Lance couldn’t put them down. The point was so that they wouldn’t make the great escape out the door once Keith tried to leave, but Lance also just liked holding them.

Keith gave Lance an unimpressed stare. “Stop calling them our children,” he countered.

At that moment, they both seemed to recognize they were being talked about, because the cats in Lance’s arms both began meowing excessively. Russel was much louder than Señorita Azura de la Mora III, but together, it was extremely annoying anyway. Lance stared down at them, surprised that they could tell who the grimalkin children were. Keith scrunched up his nose, bothered by the noise.

“Aw, Keith, they know we’re talking about them!” Lance cooed, hugging them closer again.

“They’re so noisy,” Keith murmured as he glared at the cats. Keith took a step forward, speaking directly to the cats, “Don’t cause too much trouble…” Then, without any warning, Keith leaned down and pecked the Somali on the head as she meowed at him. “Bye, Russel,” he said softly. He kissed the Russian Blue on the head next. “Bye, Azura.” Lance nearly had a heart attack as Keith raised his head, appearing as though he was about to lean in towards Lance but stopping abruptly and pulling back. They stared at each other with wide eyes. A blush began to paint itself across Keith’s face the longer he stared back at Lance. Quickly, he mumbled out, “Bye, Lance,” before spinning on his heel and beelining it out the door without another word.

Lance didn’t lock the door. He didn’t let the cats down. He didn’t do anything. As the seconds ticked by, Lance just stood there and stared at the closed door. If he wasn’t going completely crazy, he could have sworn that Keith had been about to kiss him. Maybe not on the lips, but he had been about to do that, that wasn’t a trick of the light or Lance’s imagination running wild, right? That had happened? Lance could feel the heat radiating off his burning face. His heart was so deafening in his chest that he almost didn’t even notice the distressed mewls of the cats in his arms when he buried his face into their fur.

Lance couldn’t even imagine how he would have reacted if Keith had actually kissed him. The worst part was that he wished he could have found out.


	16. Leafing Things Behind

The pull of the wind at Keith’s body was a perfect distraction from everything, it always had been. When it was just Keith, his bike and miles of open road, it wasn’t too difficult to forget whatever was weighing him down before. Maybe that was why he loved his bike so much. The roar of the engine, the speed, the tugging of his clothing from the air, all of it was unmatched, and it kept Keith’s mind carefully off the strange incident that had occurred before Keith had left the house. Keith wouldn’t even let himself remember Lance’s shocked and startled face as Keith was about to lean in to… to what? Kiss him? Keith wasn’t sure what his plan was. Whatever, didn’t matter, bike and road, yup, that’s all that mattered.

Acxa’s place wasn’t really far away. It was on the outskirts of the next town over, two hours away, but Keith rather liked it. Less people, quieter, more plant life, and they could have campfires without anyone complaining. Shiro lived in that town too, so by the time that Keith rolled up to Acxa’s house, Shiro was already sat on a lawn chair in front of the fire that Acxa loved to build so much. She was a huge fa of roasting food over open flames. Keith and Shiro had offered to get her a barbecue once, but she didn’t seem to find it nearly as enjoyable. As Keith hopped off his bike and made his way up the path toward the fire, he could see that she was, indeed, cooking something.

Once he was close, Shiro and Acxa both seemed to notice him at the same time, turning to stare at him with apprehension before Shiro broke out into a wide grin and Acxa’s lip quirked up.

“Keith! It’s so good to see you!” Shiro greeted happily, standing from his chair to meet Keith halfway and pull him into a bone-crushing hug.

Keith hugged back. “Yeah, you too,” he smiled. “And Acxa, happy birthday. What are you now? Sixty-three?”

Acxa gave him a flat look, her smile disappearing immediately. “You’re not funny. But thanks, it was a happy birthday until you showed up, so…”

Shiro laughed wholeheartedly and smacked Keith on the back. “Come on, be nice, it isn’t often that we can all get together.”

Acxa snorted, “Yeah, because Keith is a NEET.”

Keith shot her a dirty look. “I’m not a NEET. When was the last time I came to visit?” He couldn’t even remember, it felt like ages ago.

“It was last year,” Acxa reminded him, with a look that suggested she was unimpressed by that fact.

“You should come visit us more often, we don’t see enough of you,” Shiro frowned. He led Keith back to his lawn chair, pulling another chair up from a pile on the lawn and handing it to Keith.

Keith, while setting his chair up on the ground next to Shiro, informed them, “I’ve been busy, but I’ll try.”

Acxa made a short noise of amusement before glancing over to Keith with a wry grin. “Busy with what? Whispering to your plants while avoiding daylight and people?”

Keith whipped his head around to glare at her. “No. I have friends. You guys both know Pidge and I’ve mentioned Allura,” he defended grumpily. His mood lifted as he thought about the man back home, waiting for him with their cats. He muttered, more to himself than anything, “And there’s also… Actually, I should have brought them along.”

Shiro leaned forward in his chair to get a better look at Keith’s expression. Keith could feel the dopey smile that was plastered across his face but he couldn’t bring himself to remove it. Just thinking about Lance sometimes made the smile come back, so there was really no use in fighting it. Keith’s heart felt rather light once he thought about Lance anyway, so why would Keith want to fight it?

“Wow,” Acxa commented, her eyes a little wider than before.

Shiro beamed, “Keith, did you get a girlfriend?” They both seemed to lean closer, fishing for details.

That snapped Keith out of his dazed daydreaming. He raised an eyebrow at Shiro, confused about how he had jumped to that conclusion. “No, he’s a guy,” Keith calmly answered, seating himself in the chair he had finally managed to set up. He watched Acxa stir the pot of stew she had propped up over the fire. Except she wasn’t doing much stirring, just a lot of confused and surprised staring.

“Huh?” Shiro uttered first.

Keith looked over at his brother to find him in a similar state of bafflement. Narrowing his eyebrows, Keith looked between the two of them, becoming more perplexed, himself. “Yeah… We moved in together,” he continued.

“Is that a joke or have you lost it?” Acxa suddenly asked. She resumed stirring the stew, then began dishing it out into bowls for the three of them.

“Acxa!” Shiro reprimanded. He glared hard at her and she looked back at him, angrily confused.

Keith didn’t really mind, he just grabbed the bowl that Acxa handed to him and stared into it ponderingly. “I must’ve lost it because I let him bring cats into our house and I’m leaving him in charge of my plants,” he muttered.

Acxa and Shiro both froze. If their eyes weren’t wide before, they sure were now that Keith had said that. “You let him bring cats…?” Shiro echoed disbelievingly.

“Your plants? You actually let someone near your plants?” Acxa couldn’t seem to wrap her head around that one, it was just such a foreign concept.

“What is this boy’s name, I need to send him a gift basket,” Shiro wiped fake tears away from his eyes, even going so far as to fake a sniffle.

Keith rolled his eyes. “Lance,” he told him, feeling the tint of pink at his cheeks and knowing it wasn’t because of the wind chill.

“So,” Acxa began, seating herself in her own chair and mixing her stew around, “are you gay, then?”

Keith was taken aback, he hadn’t been expecting that question. His eyes widened and he nearly dropped his stew. “No, I–” he paused. “We aren't- I don’t…”

His thoughts swirled with images of Lance. Lance’s drunken face on his doorstep, Lance arguing with him about aliens, Lance coming over again and again with food, Lance under the streetlight in the snow, Lance at the bookstore, Lance tracking Keith down to walk home with him, Lance playing pool, Lance with his family, Lance pulling him into the snow pile, Lance making him meals, Lance in his work outfit, Lance telling Keith he was excited about the flowers blooming, Lance’s smiling face first thing in the morning, Lance getting upset about blackberries, Lance picking up the cats, Lance all the time. Lance, Lance, Lance. His heart was going wild and he could feel the heat positively pouring off his skin. The bowl of stew shook as Keith’s hands began quivering. Everything suddenly started to slot into place. Keith liked Lance.

Keith had always liked a lot of things about Lance, and he had always liked Lance, but this wasn’t the same. Keith liked Lance’s smile, and how excitable he was. He liked that sometimes Lance’s mind worked too fast for his mouth and he’d end up spitting out a bunch of half-finished sentences. He liked Lance’s laugh and his shitty jokes. Keith liked that whenever Lance would reference something that Keith didn’t get, Lance would subtly explain it to him without being condescending or rude about it. Keith liked that Lance could make anything fun and he could bring Keith out of his shell more. He liked that Lance could tell how he was really feeling and what he was really thinking. At first it had been irritating and bothersome, but now Keith found that his thoughts were things he had difficulty expressing to Lance, so it made him happy that Lance just knew. Keith loved how kind and generous Lance was, always willing to help people. He liked how confident and outgoing Lance was. Keith liked when Lance was sleepy and grinned at him while giggling. He liked when Lance concentrated on something really hard and his lips pursed a little bit. He liked that Lance was trying his best to learn everything about plants without Keith noticing, even though Keith could tell.

Wow. How hadn’t Keith realized it before? He liked Lance, he really liked Lance. Now that the thoughts were flowing, he couldn’t make them stop. He wanted to hold Lance’s hand and touch his face. He wanted to run his fingers through Lance’s hair and kiss his skin all over. He wanted to sleep next to Lance and cuddle with Lance. He wanted it to be Lance and Keith. Not, Lance… and then… Keith.

Keith realized he had been staring off into the middle distance for some time and his siblings were beginning to worry. Finally, he muttered out, “Fuck, I like Lance…” and his heart palpitated in agreement.

 

◊ ◊ ◊

 

The moon shone down over the open countryside fields, illuminating everything and creating strange shadows. Keith was seated on the porch steps, staring up at it, his face bathed in a gentle bluish glow. A light breeze fluttered by, causing Keith to cozying farther into his jacket. His fingerless gloves didn’t do much to help against the cold night, but he worse them anyway, blowing air into his hands to keep himself warm. The fire in the firepit ahead of him had long since been put out and Keith couldn’t help but wish they had left it. At least he had his cigarette to distract himself.

Earlier, Shiro and Acxa had teasingly asked him about Lance after they had gotten over the initial confusion and shock from realizing that Keith was interested in another man. Not that Keith could really blame them, he was also confused and shocked. After talking it out with them, though, Keith quickly began to feel more than comfortable with his new revelation. Except, it did bring up other questions. What was Keith going to do after he got home? What if Lance didn’t like him back? What if Lance did like him back? What did Keith actually want from this? These feelings were all still so newly realized, he wasn’t entirely sure. Some part of him was still scratching at the back of his mind and telling him that any relationship he would get into would only end in a disaster because of his father. He couldn’t shake that part.

Once that discussion had died down, they had all talked about their jobs and how those were going. Shiro worked at a museum, which he really loved. He had mentioned that they were getting a new exhibit put in and he was excited about it. Keith couldn’t help but be excited too, just from the way Shiro explained it. Acxa worked as a police chief in the local department. The town they both lived in was much bigger than the one Keith lived in, so police chief was a big deal. She was very good at her job too, especially since she was so intimidating.

They all chatted about recent events that had happened, like Shiro’s story about a kid who had planned to eat popcorn in the museum, even though he wasn’t allowed. His plan was to fill both of his sleeves entirely with popcorn, and then just eat it when no one was looking. He had apparently tripped on the stairs and launched all the popcorn right out of his sleeves like cannons, right in front of Shiro. Shiro had a difficult time even telling the story with how much he was laughing about it.

Acxa shared a story about a guy who had called the police, only to realize that he had meant to call the telephone directory, whose number was extremely similar. The police showed up anyway, as per the protocol. Yet, by some uncanny coincidence, someone happened to be robbing the house next door and came out just in time to be caught by the police.

They also talked about their friends. Keith brought up Allura and Pidge, what they were doing. He talked a little bit about Hunk, Lance’s best friend, even though he had never actually met the guy. Shiro talked about his best friend, Matt, who worked at the museum with him. He turned out to be the brother of Pidge, which they both found to be odd the first time they realized it. Acxa talked about her friends on the police force, Zethrid, Narti, Ezor, and Lotor. Well, she claimed that Lotor was a friend but Keith got the vibe that she didn’t really like him.

By the time they were finished their conversation and all the stew was gone, the moon had begun to rise and the fire had begun to die down. Shiro had suggested they call it a night. They had packed everything up, and all gone inside. Keith hadn’t been in there long before he felt the urge to smoke hit him once again. And that was how Keith had ended up sitting on the porch with a cigarette in his hands, staring at the moon in the sky.

A heavy sigh left him, taking a cloud of smoke with it. Keith couldn’t help but grimace at the smog.

Behind him, the screen door creaked as it was opened up, slamming shut after the person had stepped out. Keith didn’t bother to turn around. He was able to identify the person by the heavy footfall over the wooden porch. “You still smoke,” Shiro pointed out as he took a seat next to Keith on the steps.

“So do you,” Keith replied. He brought the cigarette to his lips, just keeping it there absently.

“No, I quit,” Shiro shook his head. His eyes were instinctively drawn away from Keith’s cigarette and up to the moon.

Keith narrowed his eyebrows and glanced at Shiro. “I can smell it on you,” he countered.

“I think you were smelling yourself,” Shiro calmly diverted, avoiding Keith’s eye. Keith continued to stare at him, not believing his brother’s bullshit. He squinted at him in suspicion. Shiro just kept staring at the moo, not replying. Finally, he sighed, “Alright, you got me.”

“I knew it,” huffed Keith. He allowed himself another drag of his cigarette as a reward.

Shiro sat up straighter and wrapped an arm around Keith’s shoulders. He tugged him into a brotherly hug, which Keith struggled, in vain, to free himself of. “I’m just trying to set a good example for my baby brother,” he announced.

“Bullshit! You used to smoke right in front of me when our father wasn’t around,” Keith complained. He attempted to scramble out of Shiro’s hold again, but the effort was futile. Keith smoked some more, debating whether it would be appropriate to fake burning himself so Shiro would let him go.

A sudden thought must have occurred to Shiro, because he abruptly let Keith go and shuffled around to better face him. “That reminds me,” he began, no longer jovial, while Keith gathered his bearings from how he had been yanked around like a ragdoll a moment ago. “Mom called around two months ago.”

Keith whipped around, nearly dropping his cigarette in the process, not that he cared though, it wasn’t nearly as important as the bomb that Shiro had just dropped on him. _“What,_ seriously? Mom? It’s been, what, sixteen, seventeen years, and she’s deciding to contact us again? _Why?!”_ Keith struggled to keep down the bitter hurt that forced its way out through his tone.

If Shiro noticed it, he didn’t say anything. Instead, he just stared distantly up at the moon once more. “She got remarried,” he stated, no malice in his voice. Keith’s eyebrows furrowed and wrinkles formed along his forehead as his face morphed into one of anger and hatred. “I met him, he’s a good, stable guy. Mom deserves someone like that, I think.” Shiro nodded. “She asked about you,” he mentioned, brightening up enough to actually look Keith in the eye again. “I told her about Marmora Garden Shop. She’s really proud of you, Keith.”

“No, she doesn’t get to be proud of me,” Keith hissed. “She left her three kids all alone to go chase some _bastard_ who didn’t even love her, that was _her_ choice. She can’t just walk back into my life like nothing happened, seventeen years later, and pretend she’s proud.” The rage that boiled within him bubbled up, increasing in heat with every word he spat.

Shiro watched him as he had his emotional outburst, not saying anything or interrupting in any way. Shiro had always been extremely understanding like that, able to listen to someone completely, always knowing exactly what to say to make someone feel better. It was helped even more by the calm demeanor he exuded. Once Keith was finished, Shiro tilted his head and asked, “You don’t want to see her again?”

Keith paused, staring at the cigarette in his hand. Usually, he would smoke when he was stressed or unsure, but it just didn’t appeal to him the same way anymore. He cringed at it. Just imagining meeting his mother again caused a tendril of pain and ire to snake its way up his spine. “No, I don’t,” he answered absolutely. If Keith did ever end up wanting to see her again, he hoped it wasn’t soon.

“What about dad?” Shiro asked next.

The hurt and fury pulsated, almost like a living thing that resided within him. “He better hope I never see him again,” Keith threatened.

Shiro hummed, “What would you do if you did see dad again? Right now.”

 _“Deck him,”_ Keith answered immediately. There was a dead look on his face.

Letting out a hearty laugh, Shiro slapped a hand on Keith’s shoulder. “Of course, I don’t expect any less from you, Keith,” he grinned, “but after that, I mean. If you actually had to talk to him about everything, and about the way you feel, and–”

“Ugh, _feelings!”_ Keith groaned, rolling his eyes before slumping forward over his knees.

“I’m serious here!” Shiro raised his eyebrows to establish his point. “You can’t understand someone’s perspective if you never bother to talk to them. What if he wants you to forgive him? What if he wants to be proud of you too, or wants to tell you to find someone nice and settle down?”

Keith scoffed, “Old man’s preaching.”

Shiro gave Keith a firm look before cuffing him upside the head. Keith startled, rubbing the back of his head with a scowl. “Really think about it, Keith. No fists, no weapons. What do you want him to know?”

Keith sat there for a moment, staring at his shoes. What did he want his father to know? What could he say to make his father understand all the pain he had caused Keith’s mother, all the pain he had caused their family? Would he want his father to hear that Keith had never needed him then and he didn’t need him now? Would he want his father to see the garden shop he had built up, to see the chokecherry trees he had cared for all those years ago? Would he want his father to understand why Keith had cried himself to sleep underneath the stars on the roof some nights, why Acxa had turned all the framed pictures in her room around so she wouldn’t have to see her father’s face, why Shiro had started smoking?

There were a lot of things that Keith could tell his father, but he didn’t want to. He didn’t have anything he really, truly wanted to say to his father. In fact, Keith could feel the anger that had taken hold of him moments ago seeping out of him gradually until all that remained was a tired sense of exhaustion. Keith glanced toward the cigarette in his hand again. Then, he sat up, feeling an aching and desperate form of relief wash over him. He threw his cigarette to the dirt and stamped it out with his foot, hardly sparing it a second look.

“I don’t know,” Keith answered slowly.

Shiro’s gaze was trained on the foot that Keith had pressed into his smoke, but he didn’t say anything regarding the action. He sighed, louder than was necessary. It succeeded in breaking the tense atmosphere that had been created. Shiro wrapped his arm around Keith’s shoulder and pulled him in again, except this time, Keith didn’t bother to prevent it. “Just remember that you deserve a happy ending. You’re allowed to be okay,” he reminded, shaking Keith’s arm as he spoke.

Keith nodded, but he didn’t answer. His eyes found the moon once more, and, as small as it was, he managed to smile again.


	17. The Root of the Problem

Lance screamed. He had been screaming quite a lot since Keith had left. The cats were terrors. Plain and simple, the cats were evil and out to get him. And after all he had done for them too. Did that mean nothing to them? Lance felt betrayed as he dropped to his knees right in front of the shattered figurine on the floor. Above him, on the shelf it had fallen from, sat a smug little Somali with her paw primed for swatting.

“That wasn’t mine!” he cried. “That was Keith’s!” He glared up at the cat, hoping to convey exactly how much she had fucked up. “He’s going to be home soon and you’ve broken it, oh my god, he’s going to kill both of us,” Lance practically sobbed, at his wits end. He poked a finger into her furry little chest. “Yeah, that’s right, Russel. It’s both our asses on the line now!”

A sudden tearing sound caused Lance’s eyes to widen and he immediately stood, stumbling his way into his bedroom as quickly as he could. There, sat on the bed, was a certain Russian Blue. She grabbed part of Lance’s comforter with her teeth and ripped back, shaking it back and forth to help heaps of the blanket come free. Pieces of cushioning spilled out of the blanket. She didn’t care, she just dug farther at the comforter with her claws.

Once again, Lance shrieked. He bolted over to the bed and lifted his cat off. Right as Lance was about to begin scolding her, she peed. Just right there, on Lance’s already destroyed comforter. Lance just wanted to cry at that point. He glared at her with a deep hurt in his eyes, waiting for her to finish. It would have been worse if it was on both the blanket and the carpet. At least the blanket could be thrown in the wash. After she finished, still staring at him with her big cat eyes, Lance hissed out, “Señorita Azura de la Mora III, I took you out of the park, I can put you back.”

Right at that moment, Lance could hear as the front door was unlocked. He squeaked, not prepared for Keith to be home so soon. Lance thought back to the figurine, momentarily forgetting about his bed and the cat in his hands. Keith was going to be pissed! Lance couldn’t even take care of two cats for two days! He did fine with the plants, but they didn’t run around and destroy everything! Maybe Keith had a point about the plants…

The door opened and a couple footsteps were taken into the apartment. “Lance?” Keith’s voice called. And boy, did Lance ever miss the sweet sound of not being left alone with two goblins.

Lance slipped out of the room, the kitten still in his grip as he held her nervously against his chest. She meowled, but Lance didn’t even hear her. “Keith! Hey! You’re back early, aren’t you?” he greeted, far too quickly for anyone who wasn’t hiding the subtle disarray of the apartment.

Keith stared at him, almost like he was studying him. He nodded, almost like he was in a trance. “Yeah, the highway wasn’t very busy…” he distractedly answered. “How’d everything go with you?”

Lance swallowed anxiously, his eyes wide and shifty. “Uh… y’know, everything was fine. The plants are good, I’m sure you noticed, you tend to notice those types of things. The cats… they, uh… they’re… cats…” Lance laughed awkwardly. Keith continued to stare at him, nodding. It was almost a little bit creepy, but something about it seemed like Keith was seeing him for the first time suddenly, so Lance didn’t bring it up. The longer they stared, the more Lance felt like his soul was being bared. “Okay! Fine! You win! Russel broke your weird figurine on the shelf there and I couldn’t stop her and I didn’t mean for it to happen! I’m sorry, Keith!” Lance broke down, wailing his apology while he hugged Azura, who grumbled in his embrace.

Keith absently glanced over to where the shattered figurine was on the floor and Russel was staring up at him with round, innocent eyes. “Oh, yeah, that thing,” he muttered. “No, that’s fine. I think Pidge gave me that. We could never tell what it was supposed to be anyway.” Keith wandered further into the apartment and dropped a backpack of stuff he had brought with him onto the couch. “Did they destroy anything else?” Keith asked, glancing around.

Lance stared back at his room. “My blanket,” he responded dejectedly.

“Can you still use it tonight?” Keith asked, furrowing his eyebrows as he walked purposefully into Lance’s room.

“Not until it’s washed and sewn back up.” He glared pointedly down at the cat still struggling against his hold.

Keith grunted in surprise. “Oh, fuck, that cat pee smell is strong,” he complained. “You’re not using this,” Keith firmly stated as he yanked the blanket off of Lance’s bed with one hand. The other arm was being used to smother his nose so the scent couldn’t reach him. He bundled it up as best he could, holding it out in front of him, as far away from his face as he could get it. Then, he hurried past Lance and into another room where he kept the washer and dryer.

Lance watched it all happened. Finally, as soon as Keith was out of his sight, his attention was drawn back to the tiny kitten in his arms. “Oh, sorry!” he startled, releasing the cat. She leaped down to the floor, staring up at Lance with a disgruntled cat-face before galloping off. He watched her go, then shook his head and rushed over to catch up to Keith. “So, do you have some extra blankets somewhere that I can use, or…?” Lance prompted, leaning into the room to watch Keith angrily jam the blanket into the washing machine.

“No, I don’t,” Keith grumbled. He lifted a socked foot to force the comforter farther into the tiny space. His eyebrows furrowed and his teeth grit.

“Then what am I going to do?” Lance wondered. He could already imagine sleeping in a cold, blanket-less bed. It wasn’t a pleasant thought. He could maybe sleep next to the heater…? He could go out and buy a blanket, but it was already getting pretty late.

Keith interrupted Lance’s train of thought. “You can use my blanket,” he suggested as he switched a bunch of dials on the machine before angrily pressing the start. The washer whirred to life.

Staring at the washing machine for a moment, Lance thought over that suggestion. “But what about you? What will you use?” he questioned.

Keith slid past him, entering back into the living room. As he passed by Lance, he answered, “The other half of it.”

“Oh, okay,” Lance nodded. He stood there for a moment with his hands in the pocket of his blue hoodie. Slowly, his mind began to catch up to what Keith had just said. The other half. He was gonna use the other half of the blanket that Lance was using. Meaning they were going to be sharing a blanket. Meaning they were going to be sharing a bed. They were going to be sleeping in the same bed. All night. Lance’s eyes widened as the implications hit him like a freight train. He turned around, body like molasses, watching as Keith opened the fridge to hunt around.

“Want me to make dinner tonight? All I know how to make are ramen cups, soup, shitty grilled cheese, and something that looks like a pancake, but definitely doesn’t taste like a pancake…” Keith called to Lance, cringing at the fridge’s contents. “Maybe you don’t want me to make dinner tonight…”

Lance was going to die.

 

◊ ◊ ◊

 

Lance was going to die.

That was the only thing running through his mind as he laid in the bed with the fresh, clean covers up to his neck. He could hear the consistent ticking of the clock in the corner of the room and he could see the imperfections in the ceiling above him. Lance tried his hardest to focus on those two things. He slid his fingers over the blanket in his hands, willing himself to calm down. It wasn’t working much. His heartbeat was deafening and his entire left arm was on fire, pressed up against the back of another person.

That person being the owner of the bed and the reason Lance was on the verge of a panic attack; Keith.

Lance’s ears felt like they were ringing with the pounding of his heart. No matter how long he stayed there, his eyelids never felt heavy, still open as wide as they could go. Slowly, Lance’s fingers gripped the blanket tighter and tighter until he couldn’t feel them anymore. The cats were cuddled together at the bottom of the bed in between his and Keith’s legs and Lance could feel as they shifted around. He could hear Keith’s light grumbling every now and again.

Keith could sleep. Keith wasn’t staying up worrying because he was too close to someone or because he was nervous. Keith didn’t think it was a big deal when he invited Lance into his bed. Keith was fine. Why? Because Keith wasn’t into Lance the way Lance was into Keith. Keith didn’t lay awake at night thinking about Lance and choking at the leap of his heart every time his arm brushed against Lance’s.

Lance could feel a panicked sweat work its way down his neck and tears begin to dot at his eyelids. Trapped. Lance was trapped. He was trapped in a rough sea of his own feelings, being pulled down further and further with no escape. This wasn’t the same as when Keith lived across the street from Lance and he had developed a small crush on his neighbour. This wasn’t the same as when he brought Keith home to meet his family. This wasn’t the same as when he moved in with Keith and adopted cats with him. This was all of those things combined, but it was even more than that too.

He was inches away from Keith and he couldn’t have any of him, he couldn’t have anything more with him. This was a small and kind gesture from Keith, and nothing more. Lance would live with Keith for who knows how long, suffering in silence, unable to have him, unable to leave him, unable to get over him, completely powerless at the mercy of his own heart, left to suffer. And Keith would be none the wiser. Keith would never know, he couldn’t know just how much Lance cared about him, how much Lance wanted him. Because Keith could never return the sentiment.

But, what if Keith did? What would Lance do? What could he do? He used to make out with random people all the time without any issue, but would he be able to do it with someone who he really cared about? Lance wasn’t so sure. And if he could, would he be able to open up his heart to Keith, would he be able to offer himself?

What about Keith? If Keith even did care about him, would Lance be enough to pull him out of his fears? Lance had never been overly enticing, there was no way he would be the one to open Keith’s heart too. Lance would probably be a substitute… again. Keith would find someone else and he would leave Lance. Or worse, maybe he would just never tell Lance that they had ended in the first place, thinking it unimportant in every regard. Keith wouldn’t do that though… would he…? Two closed hearts didn’t equal a shared open one, the math just didn’t add up, no matter how Lance looked at it.

Would Lance one day come home to a happy Keith, excitedly rambling about a date he had with some girl which was coming up? Would Keith be digging through his closet, trying on all his clothes while Lance was forced to sit there, watching Keith get dolled up for some chick, giving his honest opinion on how Keith looked? Lance would tell Keith he looks fantastic in everything he tries on, and Keith wouldn’t believe him, but Lance wouldn’t be able to lie about Keith’s appearance if he tried. Would Lance see Keith off with a final smile to give the guy confidence? Would Keith come home singing praises about the girl who could open his heart back up?

How many times would she come over, sleep next to Keith the way Lance was doing right then, whispering to Keith and holding him? How many times before Lance would be forced to move out because she was moving in? Would Lance be invited to their wedding? What if Keith asked Lance to be his best man, to give a speech in front of everyone about how lucky the two of them were to have each other? Could he do it without grimacing? Without choking on his words? Without running off to the bathroom to cry his heart out? Keith would figure it out.

Or what if Keith did get a girlfriend and she broke his heart? Lance wasn’t sure if he could sit on the couch and hold a broken-hearted Keith without his own heart mimicking. Consoling the boy that he liked while he cried over someone else, that was agony for Lance. He liked Keith too much for that now, but what if it got worse? What if it didn’t go away, and it didn’t stay at the intense feeling of attraction he had now? Lance could see it, he could so easily see himself falling in love with Keith. All those years of closing off his heart to anyone and everyone, and he could feel it all slipping through his fingers every time Keith laughed or smiled in his general direction. Lance could fall in love with him. Just like he had with Nyma.

He was doomed. He was doomed to simmer in his unrequited, unrelenting feelings for the guy laying next to him, so close, yet so far.

“–ance? Lance?” a soft and deep voice suddenly pulled him out of his thoughts.

He hadn’t realized it, but he had already worked himself to tears with the way his brain was thinking. Droplets poured out of his eyes and down his face, coating them in a thick layer of salty water. He sniffled, heaving in a breath, unable to catch any air. His lungs were burning. Saliva spilled out the edges of his lips but he couldn’t collect it all, too panicked and scattered to follow through properly. His chest heaved again. Lance’s shoulders shook with the weight of his sobs.

The bed shifted next to Lance as Keith moved around to face him. “Lance?” he called out softly once more. “What’s wrong?”

Lance couldn’t even speak, too busy attempting to regulate his breathing. A squeaking noise left him, hyperventilation kicking in. Lance was frozen on the spot, so stuck and helpless in his situation that there was nothing he could do.

Suddenly, a cool hand calmly and gently floated its way over to Lance’s face, cupping his cheek. Keith’s hand fit so perfectly against his skin, an anchor he could grasp onto. The soft thumb smoothed over Lance’s wet cheek, mopping up the tears that his eyes had left behind. Lance wasn’t looking at Keith, too out of it to think about searching Keith’s expression, but he could feel as Keith shuffled forward a little farther. Keith’s hand slid over Lance’s jaw and around his neck. His fingers pushed upwards, into his hair, tangling amongst the strands and holding him so firmly, yet delicately. With a tender tug, Lance was rolled into Keith’s chest. His hands instinctively shot out to grasp at Keith’s shirt as he sobbed.

They stayed that way for a moment, the only sound around them being that of Lance’s gasping breaths. Keith just held him, rubbing soothing circles into the back of his head with his fingers. After what felt like forever, Keith finally spoke.

“Some nights,” Keith whispered, “when my father never came home, I could feel my family coming apart around me.” Lance’s breathing began to even out as he listened to Keith, feeling the way Keith’s jaw tapped against the top of his head when he spoke. “I didn’t know what to do… There was nothing I could do… On those nights, I’d cry.”

Lance breathed shakily, yet deeply, letting the air fill his lungs completely as he listened to Keith’s story. The other man’s hand was still in his hair, holding him safely and tightly. Lance let himself nestle closer to Keith, relishing in the feeling of Keith’s arm around him even as it stung his heart. His eyes closed.

“My mom would come in when she heard me. She would lay next to me in my bed, pull me close, and hold me just like this,” Keith confided quietly. “And I would cry until I was tired and had a headache. Then I’d stop and she would whisper to me about how everything would be okay. I didn’t feel so sad or lonely afterwards, because I knew she was there, and I knew my father would come back.” Keith’s voice caught a little as he carried on. “But when he didn’t, and mom left, I didn’t have anyone to be there for me…” His voice tapered off at the end.

Lance waited patiently, his eyes opening minimally to stare at the dark shadows around Keith’s neck. The silence stretched on, encompassing Lance and settling over him like a blanket. He watched as Keith’s throat swallowed thickly and his words spilled out, almost too quiet to hear. “I adored my parents, but they left me… and it’s so lonely when someone you love and trust leaves you. That changes everything. You become a bit strange then. I just want you to know that I’ll never leave you… As long as you want me here, I’ll be here. The world’s not as lonely that way.”

A clipped breath left Lance. His fingers curled around Keith’s shirt tighter and his heart pulled painfully at his chest. Tears trickled down his cheeks again.

“We deserve a happy ending. We’re allowed to be okay,” Keith muttered, pressing his lips into Lance’s hair as he spoke. His arms tightened around Lance, pulling him a little closer. Lance could feel himself drifting off to sleep, even as he listened to Keith’s words. They filled him with warmth, something to trust in, and for the first time in a long time, Lance believed that he would have a happy ending.


	18. Room to Grow

It was around a week after the entire incident in Keith’s bed when Lance decided that he had had enough of being cooped up in the apartment for so long. Not that he didn’t like the apartment, because he did. He liked it so much, in fact, that ever since he had moved in with Keith, he hadn’t even bothered to seriously look for another apartment. Whenever he did, Keith would help him. It wasn’t really help though because he found something wrong with every apartment they looked at. It got to the point where Lance began to wonder if Keith even wanted him to move out. He stopped looking eventually, and that was when there was still snow on the ground. Now, it was the middle of summer and Keith still hadn’t brought it up. Lance felt a warmth bloom within him whenever he thought about it.

But as it stood, Lance still needed to get out and enjoy the nice weather before it got rainy or something. The flowers had finally begun to bloom, beautiful pinks and purples dotting the hills near their apartment. Luscious green trees that waved in the wind and rich grass the perfect plushness for someone to lay on. Lance couldn’t wait to get out there and enjoy everything mother nature had to offer him. And he knew that Keith was probably itching to go see the flowers on the ridge just as much as Lance was.

“Hey, Keith?” Lance called over his shoulder from where he was rested against the windowsill. He didn’t take his eyes off the blue of the sky and the streaks of colours as birds raced by, singing their songs.

“Yeah?” Keith called back. His footsteps sounded as he made his way around the corner from the laundry room into the living room.

Lance smiled, still watching the outdoors. “We should eat lunch outside; the weather hasn’t been this nice in awhile,” he suggested.

Keith shuffled behind him, wandering his way to the kitchen, it sounded like. Plates clattered as they were moved. “Weren’t we going to have barbecue today?” he asked. Lance could practically hear the raise of his eyebrow.

“Hmm, yeah…” Lance drew out, “but we can do that tomorrow! C’mon, I’ll make a picnic.”

Keith grunted, “A picnic?”

Lance spun around to lean his back into the windowsill and stare at Keith in the kitchen. “Mini sandwiches, fruit salad, lemonade, the whole nine yards,” Lance grinned, already excited at the idea.

Keith paused where he was searching through the fridge and turned to stare at Lance, his hip cocked out to the side as he leaned against the door. “Alright,” Keith hummed. At his feet, Azura stretched her back, pressing her legs out in front of her and pointing her tail as far into the air as it could go. Russel circled around Keith’s legs. She batted a paw at Keith’s sweatpants, meowing loudly to get his attention. Keith snorted, untangling himself from the fridge door to squat down beside the two cats. He ran his palm roughly over Russel’s back, chuckling at the way she butted her head just as violently into his kneecap. “You and Azura are going to keep watch, right?” he smiled down at her.

Russel meowled again, drawing in Azura’s attention, who also meowed in agreement.

“Good. You’re great guard cats.” He nodded.

Lance couldn’t help the smile that tugged at his lips if he tried. “I think they deserve their own picnic,” Lance decided. Pushing himself off the windowsill, Lance made his way into the kitchen to see what kind of picnic snacks he could put together before they made their way out. Keith, meanwhile, scooped Russel up, dumping her on his shoulder, then he grabbed Azura, cradling her in his arms.

“I agree,” Keith grinned. He scooted past Lance so he could reach the cupboard where they kept the cat food. The cats meowed excitedly upon realizing what Keith was getting from the shelf. “Ow, don’t pick,” Keith complained, glaring over his shoulder at Russel, who had begun to dig her claws into Keith’s shoulder out of anticipation.

“Good kitty, keep that up,” Lance laughed, scratching Russel behind the ear. He received a deadpanned glare from Keith, which he smirked at before returning to his picnic food making.

 

◊ ◊ ◊

 

“I can’t believe it’s already summer! Time sure does fly,” Lance commented, studying the sky as he shoved another mini sandwich into his mouth. A warm breeze fluttered his hair and he sighed at the feeling. The trees rustled in harmony, a couple leaves coming loose and floating through the air. Lance watched them with a content smile.

“It’s only June eighteenth, not summer,” Keith replied.

Lance glanced over from where he was seated cross legged to the man next to him. Keith was sprawled out in the grass, his hair splayed out around his head like a lion’s mane. There was a soft expression on his face, relaxed and tranquil as he supported his head. Keith’s eyes were closed, which was a good thing since it gave Lance the chance to really look at him. “It feels like summer,” Lance reasoned. “Don’t you feel like it’s hotter than normal this year?”

One of Keith’s eyes cracked open to stare lazily at Lance. “Global warming,” he drawled. His eye shut again.

Lance laughed, turning his attention to the flowers next to Keith’s head. They were white with bright, yellow, cylindrical centres. In all his flower research and all his time spent with Keith in his plant shop, he had never seen a flower that looked like it. He couldn’t even fathom a guess as to what it would be, but it was beautiful nonetheless.

“Can I have a grape?” asked Keith, opening both of his eyes as he did.

“Yeah,” Lance said. He grabbed the container of grapes they had brought with them and held it out to Keith. Rather than take it, however, Keith just opened his mouth and waited. “Are you expecting me to feed you?” Lance snorted.

Keith huffed a noise in affirmation. He was really lucky that Lance was in such a good mood from being outside in the fresh air, because Lance decided to comply. He pulled a grape off its branch and gently pressed it against Keith’s tongue. The man accepted it, grinning and humming as he chewed. There was a sleepy glaze to his eyes as he stared at Lance and it was infectious, pulling Lance into a sense of fatigue. Combined with the warm caress of the sun, Lance was sure he could easily fall asleep right there if he really wanted to.

A butterfly trailed along past the both of them and Lance watched it go, but Keith’s attention had switched over to the flowers around his head which Lance had been inspecting earlier. Keith languidly reached out to stroke his fingers across the petals, smiling softly at the little bloom.

“What’s that flower called?” Lance questioned.

Keith pet the flower again, a look of remembrance coming over his face. His eyebrows raised slowly, then he closed his eyes and rolled away from the flower again. Lance watched him with interest, waiting for his answer.

“I don’t know,” Keith muttered.

“What?” Lance shot before he could stop himself. His eyes widened in confusion.

Keith shrugged. “I forgot.”

“Uh…” Lance stared harder at the flower, then back at Keith. “No, you didn’t. You don’t forget flowers, your whole life is flowers,” Lance reminded.

“People forget sometimes,” Keith reasoned. His eyes remained shut and unbothered.

Lance pressed his hand into Keith’s forehead, concern taking over his actions. “Are you feeling alright? Are you having a stroke?”

Keith swatted the hand away. “Lance, I’m fine,” he grumbled.

“You’ve been acting strange lately. Do I need to call someone?” Lance leaned a little closer to Keith, trying his best to tell if there was any discolouration in Keith’s features.

 _“Lance,”_ Keith groaned, ignoring his questions in favour of glaring at him.

Lance glanced back the way they had come to get to the hill behind their apartment. It wasn’t that far a walk, Lance could hurry over there and grab his phone. Who would he call? Probably one of Keith’s friends, they might know what to do. It might’ve sounded like Lance was overreacting, but Keith forgetting a plant’s name, and then not even caring that he had forgotten, that was a huge thing. In all the time that Lance had known Keith, there wasn’t a single time that Keith didn’t instantly have the answer to a plant related question, even the most ridiculously obscure ones. Knowing the name of a flower that grew in the park shouldn’t have been any trouble for the plant lover.

“Your hair’s longer,” Keith pointed out lazily. Lance startled as he felt a hand reach its way up and across his neck to tangle amongst the hair at the back of his neck. It was unexpected, but not unwelcome. Keith’s nimble fingers gently twirled his hair around.

“I need a haircut…” Lance sputtered out. He could feel his cheeks heating up, but he tried not to bring too much attention to it.

“Pretty soon you’ll have a mullet too,” Keith teased. He chuckled a little bit as he smoothed out Lance’s hair and all Lance could do was stare down at Keith, a little frazzled and too confused to move. Keith’s eyes studied every inch of his face, shimmering and inviting as they did.

Lance swallowed, “I really hope not.” It was all he could say, still wide eyed and focused entirely on Keith.

The hand around his neck tightened its grip minutely. In an instant, Lance was tugged forward. He braced himself on his elbows, watching as Keith surged upwards the rest of the way to meet him. It felt like a fraction of a second and a lifetime all at once as their lips connected. Keith’s lips weren’t chapped like he’d thought they would be, but the kiss was so feather-light that it was almost hard to tell. Keith smelled so good and fresh like summer itself. He looked gorgeous when he was up that close to Lance too. Not that he ever didn’t look gorgeous, but especially when he was close enough that Lance could see the barest hint of freckles on his skin.

Lance would have had a chance to focus on all those things about Keith, if his brain hadn’t ruined it with a constant, screeching chorus of _‘Keith just kissed me! What the fuck?! What’s happening?!’_ Lance stared at Keith, gaping and lost.

Keith didn’t seem fazed at all. He just leaned back down into the grass. His hand released itself from around Lance’s neck and landed on the hill, outstretched beside Keith. There was a stretch of silence as they both stared at each other. Lance in confused hopefulness and Keith in contemplative uncertainty.

“Did you keep your eyes open the whole time?” Keith suddenly asked with an unimpressed tone. He raised his eyebrow.

Lance screeched, _“What was that?!”_ He instinctively reached his hands up to his mouth, pressing the tips of his fingers into his lips. He could still feel the phantom sensation of Keith tingling against his skin. _"We’re outside!”_ his voice cracked.

Keith, still laying in the grass and unconcerned, stared up at the sky. “Yeah, because you wanted to have a picnic,” he pointed out.

Keith was completely composed and Lance couldn’t understand how. On one hand, Lance hadn’t felt an excitement, an adoration as strong as this since Nyma, but on the other hand, Lance was panicking. Did Keith just kiss him for no reason? Did it mean something? Did Keith want to date Lance? That was an exhilarating thought that brought rushes of warmth and happiness to his heart, but it also opened so many more doors. Was Lance even ready for a relationship? He knew, logically, that Keith would never cheat on him, would never hurt him the way that Nyma had, yet he still couldn’t shake the nagging voice in the back of his mind that told him he would never find someone who would be happy with him.

Every part of Lance’s heart was screaming at him to lean back down and kiss Keith again, to run his hands through Keith’s hair and smile into his lips, to laugh with Keith and be happy with Keith. Every part of Lance’s heart wanted that, he wanted to be with Keith. But his mind wasn’t listening. His mind shouted that this was dangerous, that it wasn’t going to be different from the last time, that Keith would get bored of him eventually. Their love was too promising to pass up, but their friendship was too precious to risk.

Lance stared down at Keith, still not moving and still wide eyed.

“I need a cigarette,” Keith mumbled. He reached around blindly, patting down his pockets and grunting when he couldn’t find what he was looking for.

“You smoked your last one already…” Lance breathed out, speaking but not really mentally there yet.

Keith glanced over to him, the same tired expression on his face. “That’s fine…” he softly replied. His focus shifted back to the flowers by his head once more. “I’m quitting anyway.”

“Why?” Lance asked. Another gentle breeze flew by, rustling both of their hair and the leaves above them.

“You gave me a reason to stop,” Keith answered. This time he smiled brightly at the flower, then directed his grin to Lance, holding eye contact for a moment. “Lance,” Keith whispered.

Something about the way Keith said his name broke Lance, the entire situation crafting a bubble of confused warmth around him and he couldn’t take it. “Keith, this isn’t fair…” he whispered back.

Keith sighed, “I know… It’s not fair for either of us…”

Lance shook his head as his eyes slipped closed. “I can’t be with you. Not yet,” Lance uttered. His heart hurt even though he knew that he was doing the right thing for himself.

A hand came up to Lance’s face, stroking across his cheek and smoothing his hair back behind his ear. Lance was almost afraid to open his eyes, but when he did, he didn’t regret it. Rather than anger or disappointment on Keith’s face, like Lance had been expecting, all that was there was an understanding smile, Lance might even say it was relieved.

“We don’t have to label it,” Keith suggested. “Just like how you used to make out with people, except it’s just me, and it’s not a one-time thing…” He tilted his head to the side in the grass, offering his most convincing eyebrow raise.

Lance studied Keith’s face for a moment, processing the words. He huffed a laugh, “Are you saying you want to be friends with benefits?” Lance slowly dissolved into giggles.

Keith snorted and rolled his eyes, his hand still combing back Lance’s unruly hair. _“No,”_ he pointedly stated, “that’s not what I’m saying.” He glared at Lance, although it held no real heat. Lance could see in Keith’s eyes that he was doing his best to get the message across, to use his words even though he had never been good at that as long as Lance had known him. “I’m saying that I’m… not like my father, and I’m saying that I… I care about you… a lot…” Keith stuttered. His eyes shifted around Lance’s face, nervous and unsure. “And I’m saying that we don’t have to force ourselves into anything. We can wait. If, one day, we’re both ready, I’d really like to make you happy, Lance,” Keith promised. His hand cupped Lance’s jaw more firmly.

Lance took a deep breath, willing himself not to cry. He didn’t even know why he was going to cry, whether it was happy tears or not. He just felt overwhelmed. Keith really wasn’t someone he could let go, he had always known that, but this proof that Keith wanted him for who he was, baggage and all, that really sealed it for Lance. Maybe he wasn’t ready to open himself up right then, but he knew that Keith wasn’t either. They could work towards that together. Lance could see a future where he happily called Keith his without worrying about anything, and that was something. It had been so long since Lance had even let himself entertain a future with someone, let alone having it within reach.

“I want to make you happy too,” Lance blubbered. He reached up to clasp his hand over Keith’s holding him in place.

Keith released a breath he had been holding, a relieved and beaming smile taking over his face. It was an expression that Lance wanted to look at forever. Keith’s hand moved over Lance’s face, wiping away a stray tear with his thumb as he continued to stare up at Lance dopily. “So, are we going to wait?” he asked.

Lance took a heavy breath and nodded, another tear slipping down his cheek. “You got somewhere to be, Keithy boy?” he laughed, although it was filled with way too much emotion for it to be a proper joke. Lance pulled his lips up into a smirk.

“No, no…” Keith responded, his own smirk forming. “I think I’ve got time. I might have to check my calendar, but…” he trailed off as Lance began to laugh. Their hands were still bound together against Lance’s cheek and he pushed further into it.

“You’re such a dick,” Lance cooed. It almost sounded like a compliment the way it rolled off his tongue and mixed with his own loving gaze.

Keith suddenly leaned forward, heaving himself up into a sitting position. Lance almost startled back, but he didn’t, still holding tightly onto Keith’s hand. Keith pressed his forehead into Lance’s, staring directly into his eyes. Up close, Lance could finally appreciate all those things he hadn’t had the time to while Keith was kissing him.

“I remember now,” Keith informed him. Lance felt Keith’s other hand snake its way over his palm. Their fingers threaded together.

“Remember what?” Lance furrowed his eyebrows in confusion.

Keith pulled away a little bit to grab one of the flowers that had been growing next to his head. The thin stem snapped as Keith pulled, coming away cleanly. Then, Keith turned back to Lance and pushed it behind Lance’s ear. The white flower made Lance’s skin glow, almost as beautiful as the contrast between their hands, still held securely within each other’s grasp.

“The name of this flower. It’s a daffodil.” Keith smiled at the bloom accentuating Lance.

Grinning teasingly at Keith, Lance muttered, “You didn’t forget, did you?”

Keith just laughed, then leaned in to press another chaste kiss to Lance’s lips, which Lance readily accepted. He hummed against the dark-haired boy’s mouth, unable to stop the way smiled into the kiss. Keith’s head tilted to the side, better accommodating their lips. They moved in sync, feeling each other. Lance pushed a little harder, chasing the electric trill Keith’s lips incited all over his body. It was natural and wholesome, filling Lance up in ways that a kiss from a stranger never could. Everything about the kiss was tame and soft, like two schoolkids on the playground, but Lance had never felt more excited. Unfortunately, Lance was forced to pull away much too soon as the feeling of Keith’s nose against his cheek tickled, causing him to laugh.

Right at that moment, as Lance and Keith were staring at each other and grinning, a large gust of wind flowed across them. Leaves and petals from nearby trees and flowers cascaded over them, covering them in a barrage of colour. Countless dandelions took to the sky, flying off to see new sights. The tree beside them rustled loudly, covering up the sound as Lance yelped, startled. He cowered in Keith’s shoulder, blocking himself from the rush of air.

Above him, Keith opened his face further to the wind, closing his eyes and relishing in the feeling. He used his upper body to shield Lance as best he could, but allowed the gust to flutter his hair and glide over his exposed skin. “God, that feels so good,” Keith sighed. “I’m glad you suggested a picnic. This is nice.”

“Yeah,” Lance agreed, letting his body go limp against Keith’s chest, “it really is.”

Lance wasn’t ready for love, but Keith wasn’t ready for love either. One day, they would be. One day, Lance knew, he would be able to open himself to Keith the way he wanted to, just like he knew, that one day, Keith would be able to do the same. And maybe, if Lance was lucky, he would find the last person he would ever give himself to, but for good reasons, this time.

Maybe the risk really was worth it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And there we have it, the thrilling conclusion to this fic. It was brought to my attention that I have a formula when I write, which is that there's always a major climax where someone generally dies, but this fic didn't really have one of those. I was trying something else out, more of a coming-of-age, accepting-oneself sort of story, not sure how well it turned out??  
> If you liked it, be sure to leave a comment, those always brighten my day, and they also let me know where I can improve!  
> Don't be afraid to read my other stuff if you're looking for more Klance, I actually have another fic in the works right now. If you like vampires, stay tuned for that. And another fic is planned for right after that too, so there's more to come!  
> Anyways, thanks for reading, it means the world to me!

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Update in three days!


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